{"id":4840,"date":"2025-07-24T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-24T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/boardgamewire.com\/?p=4840"},"modified":"2025-07-24T14:00:58","modified_gmt":"2025-07-24T13:00:58","slug":"gamefound-accelerates-challenge-to-kickstarter-by-buying-veteran-crowdfunding-pioneer-indiegogo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/boardgamewire.com\/index.php\/2025\/07\/24\/gamefound-accelerates-challenge-to-kickstarter-by-buying-veteran-crowdfunding-pioneer-indiegogo\/","title":{"rendered":"Gamefound accelerates challenge to Kickstarter by buying veteran crowdfunding pioneer Indiegogo"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Tabletop gaming crowdfunding platform\u00a0Gamefound<\/a>\u00a0has bought veteran Kickstarter<\/a> rival Indiegogo, adding a potentially massive new source of backers for its creators’ campaigns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The surprise acquisition increases the heat on Kickstarter from its upstart competitor Gamefound, which has been rapidly whittling down the crowdfunding giant’s lead in the tabletop gaming space over the past three years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gamefound began life as a Kickstarter pledge manager in 2015, before Marcin \u015awierkot, the founder of board game publisher Awaken Realms, set his sights on beating the crowdfunding giant at its own game in the tabletop sector in 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gamefound scored six of the top ten most-funded campaigns in 2024, including\u00a0$7.6m for the second placed Cyberpunk 2077 board game<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0$7.4m for Lands of Evershade<\/a>. Kickstarter only filled three of the top 10 spots, with Cosmere, the fourth-placed\u00a0Altered TCG<\/a>\u00a0and tenth-placed\u00a0Trench Crusade<\/a>, while BackerKit claimed the fifth-largest campaign with about\u00a0$5m for the MCDM RPG<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Earlier this year Gamefound CEO \u015awierkot told BoardGameWire<\/a> he had set an “extremely ambitious and yet achievable goal\u201d to outperform Kickstarter in tabletop game funding in 2025, after his company saw project funding on the site soar 49% in 2024 to more than $85m.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coupled with dollars raised through Gamefound\u2019s late pledge and pledge manager operations, the site\u2019s total dollars raised from backers last year reached about $156m, compared to $220m raised on Kickstarter’s tabletop category in 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But while Gamefound has been growing at a significant rate since the Covid-19 pandemic, Kickstarter\u2019s tabletop crowdfunding totals have been headed in the other direction – with dollars raised falling 12.4% in 2022, about 4.3% in 2023 [according to Tabletop Analytics data], and 2.7% last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indiegogo<\/a> has raised close to $3bn since it was launched – a year before Kickstarter – in 2008, and boasts about 14 million user accounts for people who have backed at least one campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Gamefound has been laser focused on tabletop gaming to date, the Indiegogo acquisition adds a company with a vast range of experience hosting crowdfunding projects across areas including music, consumer tech, holiday trips and outdoor furniture – as well as singular campaigns such as raising over $700,000 to give a school bus monitor a holiday<\/a> after a video of her being bullied by children went viral. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The site’s most successful fundraises have included almost $15m for bee hive developer Flow Hive<\/a>, over $6m for Sondor electric bikes<\/a> and about $4.6m for film sequel Super Troopers 2<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indiegogo does feature its own tabletop gaming category, but none of its campaigns over the years have come anywhere near the multimillion-dollar successes found on Kickstarter, Gamefound and BackerKit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most successful monetarily to date was Beware of Bears, which raised about $160,000 four years ago<\/a>. Older campaigns through the site have included Phil Walker-Harding’s Sushi Go!, which raised about $7,200 in 2012<\/a>, and Artipia Games’ Among the Stars, which collected about $43,000 the same year<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking to BoardGameWire about the Indiegogo buyout, \u015awierkot said the deal would boost exposure to its Gamefound campaigns by making them discoverable through the Indiegogo platform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said Gamefound campaigns would begin appearing on Indiegogo after “a short transition period of putting Indiegogo on our tech”, but said he was not yet ready to commit to an exact timeline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When asked if there was a danger of the acquisition causing Gamefound to lose focus on its tabletop success, \u015awierkot said, “No, just the opposite – I think it is an amazing opportunity. It will be the same platform, so it’s not like we need to suddenly develop two different services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Gamefound CEO Marcin \u015awierkot<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

“But we will be able to increase our team, so I expect the opposite – faster development of the platform with great features that will work in all categories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“On top of that, we are extremely committed to keeping high standards in regards to helping and communicating with creators and backers.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u015awierkot added, “Our success comes from a simple philosophy: build a platform at least twice as good as the next competitor, and then dedication, hard work and focus from our team to make it happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Now, we\u2019re bringing this philosophy to Indiegogo, combining Gamefound\u2019s technology with Indiegogo\u2019s incredible reach to revolutionize crowdfunding for every category.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When asked if the move heralded Gamefound attempting to overtake Kickstarter in other, non-tabletop categories through Indiegogo, he said, “As always the goal is to have an amazing platform for backers and creators – so this is a central line on top of our minds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“As a direct result of that (and measurable rate of progress) it was becoming the biggest platform in tabletop space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Now, this is very similar to Indiegogo – we feel we have a lot to offer with our platform already and even more is on the way. So our focus will be to create great value in other categories for creators and backers, same as we did in tabletop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Will we overtake other categories as a result of that? Hard to tell. But I really believe in our technology and the team behind it.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more stories like this direct to your email inbox, click here to sign up for BoardGameWire’s free email newsletter. \n\nAnd if you’ve found our reporting interesting or useful, please consider a paid subscription to help support our journalism!<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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