Third Academy
Sector
Round Size ($USD)
$2,000,000.00
Post Valuation
$35,000,000.00
Stage
Existing Commitment
Deal Type
Deal Stage
Deal Status
Ecosystem
Founder Name
Deal Source
Min Investment
Discord Thread Link
Website
Investment Memo / Deck
AMA
Date Approached
Aug 7, 2023
Description
Third Academy is a blockchain based platform for learning, working, and collaborating in web3.
TGE date
Description
Third Academy is a blockchain-based social education platform for learning, working, and collaborating in Web3. Users can earn credentials validating their Web3 skills, find jobs, or pitch projects within the Third Academy platform and metaverse ecosystem.
Third Academy currently has six metaverse campuses that can be used for co-working, live-stream events, NFT exhibitions, virtual conferences, hackathons, and educational classrooms.
Business Model
Third Academy expects to derive revenue from various sources.
- Community Tenancies – branded area for events, co-working, product demos, and corporate training.
- Streaming /Broadcast Packages – Tenants may upgrade their spaces with autonomous A/V packages and expanded streaming, virtual conferencing, and meeting capabilities.
- Metaverse Conferences – % of virtual attendee registrations, direct conference sponsorships, virtual goods, and the sale of “in-metaverse” exhibits/sponsor booths.
- Sponsorships – all areas of public campuses are available for branding, advertising, or naming rights acquisition for a limited, renewable period.
- Marketplaces/Virtual Goods – brands can lease autonomous shops or multiple brands can contribute to campus marketplaces.
- Co-Working Memberships - Initial limited access is free. Expanded platform and metaverse co-working capabilities are available via the purchase of NFTs.
- Credentialing –Third Academy provides SBTs to validate skills and knowledge in Web3 for a fee.
Traction
With three months of organic marketing and word-of-mouth promotion, Third Academy reached over 35 organizations with 70k+ of their members ready to participate in events.
Third Academy expects to go live in a month with all its six metaverse sites currently booked and 216+ events scheduled.
- 2.1k Discord scholars
- 2k+ students registered for courses
- 3.4k+ newsletter subscribers
- 35+ brand partners
- 5.5k Twitter followers
- 70k+ co-working memberships registered
Go-to-Market
Target Personas
- Community Leaders
- Web3 Professionals
- Newbies to Web3
- Company Biz Dev Professionals
- Conference and Event Producers
- Recruiters
Consumer Journey
- Attracting Attention
- At the top of the funnel, Third Academy gets the “attention” of the individual consumer, community group, and/or company when they see outbound events streaming live to their favorite social media channel or are invited to an “in-world” event. All roads lead to the Third Academy platform and Third Academy live and recorded content on the platform and various SM channels.
- Consideration
- A new user creates a free profile and then, via their profile dashboard, can search Web3 education content, test for SFT credentials, and join communities. An upgraded paid profile is required for value-added functionality, such as the recruiter matching system, metaverse co-working space, and select ticketed events.
- Decision
- Event invites from communities to which Web3 enthusiasts already belong, rapidly turn users into members. To accept an invite, users must create a free account - making the allure of Third Academy very sticky. With free and paid profiles, users can access ongoing social feeds, community posts, and event invitations and receive progress updates on their study path. Free participation becomes a gateway of exposure to ecosystem add-ons.
Stages of Marketing
- Pre-launch
- Third Academy has recruited micro-influencers in the Web3 space to do shows in their main campus metaverse lounge. Third Academy is building an organic teaser campaign that uses members of their existing communities to promote Third Academy to potential members.
- Post-launch
- Third Academy will run promotions via paid campaigns at all events, campuses, and communities with videos across social media that highlight use cases, social events, and metaverse campus co-working. Additionally, they will utilize the resident organizations and influencers already on the site to do promotional giveaways to their communities. Third Academy will also enlist Web3 marketing options like Link3, Galxe, and Zealy.io.
- Co-Marketing
- Existing partners actively promote Third Academy as the destination for all their events, many moving activities completely from Twitter Spaces into the metaverse and live streaming the event to their other channels such as YouTube and Discord.
Founders
Stacy Quackenbush, CEO
Michael Baron, COO
Eva Cigic, Head of Product
Mihael Fugaj, UX Designer
Damir Bijuklic, Dev Lead
Paige Dansinger, VP of Metaverse
Brianna Amore, Metaverse Design
Melissa Lander, Metaverse Event Production
Deal
$2mm at $35mm bridge SAFT
Closing in 1 month
1kx and Sfermion in negotiations on follow-on
Deck
Commitment
1kx and Sfermion in negotiations on follow-on
Previous seed round investors - Sfermion, 1kx, Atka, Nexgen, Morningstar
Investment Memo