In January of this year, Mattel began its journey into web3 by auctioning three exclusive NFTs for a Barbie collaboration with the luxury fashion brand Balmain. RealThirdWeb covered this story in a recent report. 

Mattel also recently hired Mike DeLaet, former senior vice president of strategic partnerships at Scopely, as their new global head of digital gaming. Mattel is hoping he will bring more gaming expertise to the company especially as they expand into web3 with their newest project collaboration – Cryptoys. He is now responsible for accelerating Mattel’s digital gaming product offerings across all major gaming platforms, including licensing, self-publishing, and web3. 

Mattel have just announced that it is launching a non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace where users can buy digital collectibles of the company’s most iconic brands. The new marketplace will ​​be called Mattel Creations, built on the Flow blockchain. Moreover, the release will coincide with their new Hot Wheels NFT collection. 

Mattel has now hired Mike DeLaet, former senior vice president of strategic partnerships at Scopely, as the global head of digital gaming. July 25th is apparently Mike DeLaet’s official start date. Mattel is hoping he will bring more gaming expertise to the company especially as they expand into web3 with their newest project collaboration – Cryptoys. He will apparently be responsible for accelerating Mattel’s digital gaming product offerings across all major gaming platforms, including licensing, self-publishing, and web3. 

Cryptoys recently closed a $23 million Series A round led by a16z Crypto with participation from Mattel, Dapper Labs, Draper & Associates, Acrew Capital, CoinFund, Animoca Brands, and Sound Ventures. The startup had only just announced a $7.5 million seed round led by a16z Crypto in October of this year. You can read more about this project at RE3W or Game Fund Partners.