Astralis Capital lauds success of PlayAIO as its first incubation investment

PlayAIO announces its landmark partnership with Astralis Capital and an investment from Astralis Fund I LP (together “Astralis”). This marks a first for Astralis as PlayAIO becomes part of a newly created gaming incubation strategy.

“With Astralis Capital, it has been a truly synergistic partnership, I couldn’t think of a better way to start a business. With Astralis on board, we have continued to see rapid growth as we grow to be a market leader within the industry” said Josh Gibbs, CEO of PlayAIO.

“It’s been great working with both Evan and Tisno. They, along with PlayAIO, continue to see the untapped potential data brings to any organization.”

PlayAIO was founded in 2023 by Josh Gibbs, formerly of Kambi and Strive Gaming in customer data leadership roles. It has quickly grown an established contracted customer base and having gone live in May 2024. The launches have been smooth and well received by their customers.

Steven Farrugia, an iGaming data veteran who built models for ComeOn Group among others, recently joined PlayAIO as CTO, and the company has bolstered the team with staff members for their bases in the UK and Malta over the past months.

PlayAIO is a data and AI business that focuses on simplicity through understanding, aiming to aid businesses to unlock the power of their biggest asset: their data. This is all done through PlayAIO’s proprietary PlayAIO Engine. The PlayAIO Engine provides an always-on strategic insights and recommendations tool.

On a real-time basis, users are guided on where action is required and where focus should be placed, recommending AI models that will provide the highest impact to customers and their revenues, be it LTVs, game recommendations, responsible gaming, and a plethora of other models that are being leveraged by customers.

Astralis’ incubation strategy is incredibly helpful to new and experienced founders alike because, alongside investment, the firm provides dedicated strategic and operational support to founders including go to market and partnership guidance.

Astralis Capital, has invested in a number of iGaming and sports startups, including the leading daily fantasy operator PrizePicks, sports/betting micro-influencer aggregator SGG Media, sports social media platform Takes, Inc. and the leading US PAM startup Strive Gaming. Astralis has developed a reputation for astute iGaming investments supported by providing expert advice to founders to help accelerate company growth.

On PlayAIO, Evan Meyer, Co-Managing Partner, Astralis Capital, said:

“What Josh and Steven are driving at PlayAIO falls exactly within the scope of startup successes we’ve seen before. They have a clear vision, execution plan and technical product know-how in a developing iGaming and online sports betting market that is quickly becoming more sophisticated and understanding of the value of effective usage of Machine Learning and data analytics. We’ve been incredibly impressed by the pipeline of potential client discussions, new customer uptake and smooth launches thus far.”

Fellow Co-Managing Partner Tisno Onggara of Astralis Capital added: “The mission of PlayAIO is ultimately the reason we decided to partner and help incubate PlayAIO. We see growing trends within the industry surrounding AI, but very few companies have the internal technology and ability to act on this. We believe PlayAIO will be one of a select group of trusted partners to the industry and will continue to competitively strengthen over time given their models and a positive market outlook. The data market is an area within gaming that will change rapidly in the next few years, and we are excited to be on that journey with PlayAIO.”

PlayAIO Unlocks the Power of Your Data with AI-Driven Optimization.