Michael Jordan is well-known for not only his basketball career but also for the various business ventures he undertakes outside of the court. He is obviously the face of Jordan Brand and is a part of other businesses as well. It seems as though he has started another venture of his own.
An article by Todd Spangler of Variety has revealed that Michael Jordan and his son Jeffrey Jordan have started a company named Heir Inc., which reportedly plans to create a “platform for athletes to connect with fans”.
The Jordans have launched Heir Inc., a new holding company that plans to build a consumer-facing community platform for athletes to connect with fans — as well as other lines of business, including an entertainment studio and consumer products. (“Heir,” of course, is a play on the Air Jordan brand at Nike.)
The company was co-founded by Jeffrey Jordan (above left) along with marketing exec Daniel George (above middle), founder of agency Limitless Creative, and Jeron Smith (above right), former CEO/co-founder of Stephen Curry’s Unanimous Media.
Heir Inc.’s first tech product, called “Heir” (heir.app), is envisioned as a Web3 personalized community platform for athletes. For the Heir product, the startup closed a $10.6 million seed funding round led by Thrive Capital, marking the venture-capital firm’s foray into NFTs (and its largest seed investment ever). Investments also came from Solana Ventures, the investment arm of public blockchain platform Solana, along with angel investors including tech entrepreneur and investor Alexis Ohanian (co-founder of Reddit), New York Knicks EVP and senior basketball adviser William Wesley and Chicago Bulls guard Lonzo Ball.
Here’s how the founders say the Heir platform will work: Athletes will sell a limited number of membership-based “seats” to fans, who will get access to digital assets and first-person NFT drops, using an exclusive Heir token built on Solana’s energy-efficient blockchain network. (NFTs, or nonfungible tokens, are used to verify ownership of unique digital content.) Supporters will have the opportunity to purchase one-time digital assets or join an athlete’s “huddle” for exclusive drops, digital goods, immersive experiences, and other perks.
“The Heir platform reimagines the creator-fan experience, to empower athletes to engage with their fans,” Jeffrey Jordan told Variety.
It seems as though the NFT craze has also hit the basketball world. Other NBA players have also done NFT-related things, such as Stephen Curry who spent $180,000 on a Bored Ape Yacht Club Digital Artwork NFT.
We’ll see if Michael Jordan’s venture is successful going forward. We’ve seen Jordan succeed in business before, so it is quite possible that his most recent venture will be productive in the future..
