NBA’s Boston team co-owner, an investor in Epic Games ventures into Indian gaming startup WinZO

Steve Pagliuca is the co-owner of the NBA Basketball team, Boston Celtics.

Indian gaming startup WinZO has raised an undisclosed amount of investment in a round with Steve Pagliuca. The company had raised $18 million from Newyork based Courtside Ventures and Singapore’s Makers Fund, just a few months ago, BusinessInsider reported.


Fantasy Gaming has been crawling up the mainstream industry lately, with India being a huge market of over a billion smartphone users projected in the year 2023.

Just as the global pandemic in the form of COVID-19 hit, many companies across the globe are banking on the opportunity. India, being one of the fastest-growing fantasy and mobile gaming markets, has seen a surge of new and innovative startups facilitating casual gamers after the Government of India banned 118 mobile apps which included PUBG Mobile.

WinZO came into existence in 2016, founded by Paavan Nanda and Saumya Singh Rathore. The startup earlier had raised $5 million in Series A fund led by Kalaari Capital.

The gaming startup has over 25 million registered users and have breached 1 billion microtransactions on their platform.

Prior to joining Bain Capital, Mr. Pagliuca was at Bain & Company where he advised many Fortune 500 companies on business strategy and growth initiatives. WinZO is Steve Pagliuca’s first bet in India, which the Founder says is “thrilled to be backed by Steve, an investor of high repute in our journey.”