Derry native's gamer coaching platform Metafy acquires U.K. platform GamersRdy

This time last year, Josh Fabian — the CEO and founder of gamer-coaching platform Metafy — had attracted more than $3 million in investment capital and was bringing in roughly $5,000 each month by providing one-on-one access to champion-level gaming coaches.

Fabian, 32, of Blairsville says Metafy is acquiring U.K.-based game-coaching company GamersRdy. The company recently raised another $5.5 million in funding led by venture capital firms Forerunner, DCM and Seven Seven Six. Fabian said Metafy is now bringing in a little under $200,000 monthly.

“Things have gone swimmingly,” the Derry native said. “We’ve hired the director of engineering from Instacart, the director of partnerships from MetaLab, a couple people from Instagram and Facebook, just a lot of really solid people. And we’ve continued scaling up.”

That scaling has included the expansion of coaching offerings. “We were dominant in one game, Super Smash Bros., and we wanted to also go after (vehicular soccer game) Rocket League, as well,” Fabian said.

That brought his attention to GamersRdy.

“This time last year, we were trying to get Rocket League coaches to join Metafy,” Fabian said. “Honestly, we were reaching out to their coaches, trying to steal them away.”

With a structure that doesn’t include hidden fees and allows coaches to create their schedules and set their rates, which range from $9 to $60 an hour, Fabian said it wasn’t difficult to attract coaches — with the exception of those at GamersRdy.

“I reached out their CEO, Alex Gilmore, and said, ‘We’re going after Rocket League and hope to become a dominant presence. You’re already there. We’re competition, but we’d love to work out a way you could join us.’ ”

The initial answer was a resounding no.

“I tried, and eventually succeeded, in getting him to hop on a call with me, and I laid everything out for him,” Fabian said. “I told him everything we were building, what was working with Metafy and what wasn’t. And at the end of the call, he asked to talk about what joining Metafy would look like.”

Since its 2018 launch, GamersRdy has grown to over 20,000 active users seeking coaching for games like Rocket League, Fortnite, Valorant and Counter-Strike. The company’s revenues during the pandemic skyrocketed, increasing by over 120% in a short six months and making 2021 its record in annual earnings.

“The decision to join Metafy was an important one,” Gilmore said. “I was keen on using the experience I had built up with GamersRdy, but I wanted to make sure that Metafy had the same aspirations and care towards our coaches and community as I had.”

Through discussions with Fabian, Gilmore said he realized how Metafy “would genuinely benefit our coaches, creators and students, enabling them to join a community with bigger growth aspirations while retaining the closeness we’ve already built amongst each other.”

Fabian said GamersRdy’s stable of more than 100 coaches will be moving over to the Metafy platform in the coming weeks, and the GamersRdy website will remain up and running to offer gaming courses.

But with Metafy building out its own course infrastructure, eventually GamersRdy will be absorbed fully into the Metafy brand.

“Metafy has a lock on the best Super Smash Bros. coaching in the world, and we’ll be able to say the same for Rocket League by bringing GamersRdy’s talent into the fold,” Fabian said. “Just like our students, we’re constantly asking ourselves how we can be better, and we’re all excited to move forward together and continue growing.”