This is a segment from the Lightspeed newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe.
XP, a ticketing resale exchange built with Solana rails, has raised $6.2 million in a seed round led by Blockchange, the platform tells Lightspeed exclusively.
L1D and Reflexive also participated in the round. XP uses Solana rails for discounted ticket sales, but hints at grander ambitions surrounding fan experience down the road.
XP is one of a number of upstart ticketing exchanges seeking to disrupt the popular but widely-disliked incumbents such as TicketMaster and SeatGeek. These ticketing titans caught the ire of the Biden administration, which just had a rule banning hidden so-called junk fees from ticketing platforms go into effect on Monday.
XP lists all-in prices by default. Its listed prices for tickets to upcoming New York Mets games roughly track with prices on TickPick, another popular resale ticketing app.
The Solana of it all comes from the ticketing codes, which are encrypted as NFTs. You wouldn’t know that from browsing the website, though — the only apparent crypto mention is the option to connect a crypto wallet and pay for tickets in USDC.
“XP has sold millions of dollars in annualized ticket sales to thousands of customers,” XP founder and CEO Mike Saunders said when I asked about the platform’s traction. He did not give a firm answer when I asked if XP would be launching a token.
Saunders has been around the block: His 1990s food ordering and menu website company was acquired by GrubHub in 2011. Saunders went on to found a tech development shop named Blueprint before starting XP, which is his first foray into blockchain.
I actually met Saunders briefly at the Solana Boston conference in October, where I recall him saying he thinks about his startup constantly and obsessively.
