100 Thieves president explains why making profit isn\u2019t their priority 100 Thieves100 Thieves president and COO John Robinson spoke candidly about the organization closing their first chapter, expanding their core businesses, acquiring companies, and if they\u2019re making a profit. Ever since 100 Thieves came onto the scene in late 2017, it\u2019s been very clear that they\u2019ve had ambitions beyond simply being an esports organization. The approach to their three core businesses of competing, content, and clothing have allowed them to stand out from the crowd. Four years and millions of dollars raised later, 100 Thieves are a multimedia and gaming company valued at $460m with an army of popular creators and players under their banner. One of the key people in their ascension, president and COO John Robinson, was recently featured on a podcast with sports business enthusiast Joe Pompliano to discuss all things Thieves. Having recently raised $60m in their Series C funding round, 100 Thieves have proven themselves to be among those at the forefront of esports and gaming entertainment, and the conversation was as wide-ranging as the org\u2019s ambitions. The investment they\u2019ve received and the health of the business were two major topics throughout. The business side of 100 Thieves $60m is a lot of money for any company in esports, especially considering 100 Thieves have previously raised plenty in the past. They received a multimillion-dollar investment from Cleveland Cavaliers owner in 2017, $25m in a round led by Drake and Scooter Braun in 2018, and $35m in July. So, what do Matthew \u2018Nadeshot\u2019 Haag and his partner Robinson plan to do with the money? \u201cA good portion of that is going to be earmarked for growing our existing businesses and then we\u2019ll reserve a little bit of money for launching some new businesses, we have a lot of great entrepreneurs and projects that we\u2019re thinking about,\u201d the 100T president explained. \u201cIf there are companies that we really admire where we share the same philosophy and the community can get really excited about them being part of the 100 Thieves family of brands that would make sense.\u201d While raising money is important to keep fueling growth, whether that\u2019s through existing businesses or acquiring or establishing new verticals, building sustainable revenue streams is vital for one day having a profitable company. They placed their early bets on esports, apparel, and entertainment, and Robinson revealed that they\u2019ve all been providing some returns. \u201cThe reason why we\u2019re really glad we made all three of these bets is because our revenue mix is roughly a third, a third, a third between them,\u201d he told Pompliano. \u201cEsports is a good investment, entertainment is a good investment, and our apparel business is a good investment because they\u2019re all paying off for us. \u201cEsports revenue is a combination of the money we make from our publishing partners like Riot and Activision as well as the sponsors and partners that support our esports efforts. On the entertainment and content sides, it\u2019s things like our popular entertainment shows. With our apparel business, it\u2019s pretty straightforward, it\u2019s direct-to-consumer where we have always-on apparel with our new Foundations line as well as our traditional drop model. \u201cAll three businesses are going well, all three are growing at very strong rates year-over-year and have gotten to be pretty substantial for us. You\u2019ll continue to see us invest in all of those.\u201d On exactly how strong those rates of growth have been over the years for 100 Thieves, the org\u2019s president and COO revealed some promising results. \u201cWe\u2019ve roughly doubled our revenue every single year and this year, between 2020 and 2021, we had the fastest-growing year we\u2019ve ever had in terms of gross dollars added to the top line,\u201d he added. \u201cI think it was 110% growth year-over-year so the business is in a really good spot.\u201d The aim for any for-profit company is to generate more money than they spend. This has proven to be difficult for organizations of all shapes and sizes in esports to date, and profitability still evades 100 Thieves in 2021. That appears to be by design, however. \u201cWe were at a point where we could have remained a mid-sized esports and gaming organization and really been thoughtful about watching costs and investment for the future and become profitable,\u201d Robinson explained. \u201cOur ambitions got much bigger, we wanted to make better content, have World Championship-quality esports teams, make great apparel, and expand into things like Higround. If you\u2019re going to do that you\u2019re going to have to make some investments for the future and that\u2019s going to be pretty expensive. \u201cWe\u2019re all big enough believers that there\u2019s so much growth that\u2019s going to happen in this industry, making bets now for the future that we think we could pay off was the right way to go. Rather than take the more conservative approach, we\u2019ve gone down the more optimistic and opportunistic path forward. \u201cIn a lot of ways, 2021 is the closing of the first chapter of 100 Thieves. We feel like we really delivered against all the promises we made. Now we\u2019ve raised more money, we\u2019re excited to expand and go after some even bigger opportunities.\u201d 100 Thieves\u2019 future Looking to the future of 100 Thieves, Robinson made it clear throughout the podcast episode that they would be investing more and more into their existing core pillars while also establishing more elements to their business. \u201cFor the four years we were so laser-focused on making sure that the three things are healthy parts of our business,\u201d he said. \u201cWe feel like in 2021 we got those in a place where they have strong leaders, great trajectory, we understand what the future looks like for those and we felt like they were in a good enough place where Matt and I could turn our attention a little bit to the future and that\u2019s where we saw the potential for Higround. In a lot of ways, Higround and peripherals is probably the fourth pillar of our business now.\u201d One trend Dexerto has observed throughout 2021 is the emergence of esports companies going public, allowing retail investors to buy a piece of the pie. Perhaps the most prominent example to date is FaZe Clan, who are expecting to achieve a $1b valuation when they list publicly in the first half of 2022. This doesn\u2019t appear to be in the pipeline for 100 Thieves any time soon, though, as Robinson, Nadeshot, and their growing team are keeping their heads down to continue to execute their long-term strategy. \u201cThe time horizon we\u2019ve always thought about is decades, not months,\u201d said Robinson. \u201cWe\u2019ve been able to raise all the capital that we need in the private markets and we feel like we\u2019ve got great investors and built an amazing team. \u201cFor now, we\u2019re focusing on executing our existing business, thinking about acquisitions, and scaling, so I can\u2019t say that going public is a big priority for us just because we\u2019re able to do all the things we want to do while remaining private.\u201d While we shouldn\u2019t expect 100T to follow in FaZe\u2019s footsteps in 2022, it\u2019s clear that they\u2019re hoping to continue their impressive rates of growth as they look to cement themselves as leaders in the wider gaming industry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
100 Thieves president explains why making profit isn\u2019t their priority 100 Thieves100 Thieves president and COO John Robinson spoke candidly about the organization closing their first chapter, expanding their core businesses, acquiring companies, and if they\u2019re making a profit. Ever since 100 Thieves came onto the scene in late 2017, it\u2019s been very clear that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66295\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}