Onefootball is a Berlin-based digital football media company founded in 2009 by Lucas von Cranach. Originally built as a mobile app aggregating football scores, news, and video content, the platform grew into one of Europe's largest football media properties, reaching tens of millions of users across more than 200 countries. The company operates under the registered entity Onefootball GmbH, headquartered in Berlin, Germany.
In 2021, Onefootball raised a $300 million Series D round at a valuation reported near $1 billion, with backing from investors including Animoca Brands, Liberty City Ventures, and the German Football League (DFL). That round marked a strategic pivot toward Web3 and digital collectibles. The company launched Onefootball Labs, a dedicated blockchain division, to issue officially licensed football NFTs and build infrastructure for clubs and leagues to engage fans on-chain.
Onefootball Labs positioned itself as an infrastructure layer for football's digital economy rather than a pure financial investor. It partnered with the Bundesliga, Serie A, and several individual clubs to release digital match highlight collectibles. The division operates on Ethereum-compatible chains and has experimented with Layer 2 scaling solutions to reduce transaction costs for retail football fans.
Notable investments and portfolio activity
Public information about Onefootball's specific investment portfolio is limited. The company's blockchain activity is primarily structured as partnership deals and licensed NFT drops rather than disclosed equity investments in third-party crypto projects. Six portfolio positions are tracked in aggregator databases, but deal terms and individual investee names have not been publicly disclosed as of early 2026. Onefootball Labs has collaborated with Sorare and other football-adjacent Web3 projects, though the nature of those relationships varies between commercial licensing and co-distribution rather than formal venture stakes.
Team
- Lucas von Cranach – Co-founder and long-time chief executive. German entrepreneur, previously worked in media and digital product development before founding Onefootball.
- Leadership of Onefootball Labs has not been publicly named in widely available sources. Public information about the Web3 division's managing team is limited.
Recent activity
Through 2024 and into 2025, Onefootball Labs continued releasing club-licensed collectibles but scaled back the volume of drops compared to the 2022 NFT boom. The broader contraction in NFT trading volumes affected the football collectibles segment directly, and Onefootball – like many sports NFT platforms – shifted messaging toward fan engagement and utility rather than speculative trading. The company did not announce a new major funding round in this period, and no significant acquisitions were reported publicly.
Onefootball's longer-term position in the crypto space depends on whether football clubs and leagues sustain interest in on-chain fan products beyond the initial NFT cycle. The company has a genuine distribution advantage – its core media app has a large, football-native user base – which gives any blockchain product a meaningful launch channel. However, converting media users into active on-chain participants has proven difficult industry-wide. Onefootball Labs is best understood as a strategic corporate entrant in the football Web3 space rather than a traditional venture capital investor. Detailed portfolio disclosures are not available through public filings or official communications as of early 2026.
Sources referenced: Onefootball official site – Crunchbase – Onefootball