Arctic7

Arctic7 helps gaming companies, film studios, and TV networks expand their stores across multiple platforms.

It’s a concept known as transmedia — when a story or world is told across multiple platforms, and where each format adds something unique to the experience. It’s not copy-and-pasting the same story everywhere. It’s like building a bigger world, one format at a time.

This company combines traditionally separate production pipelines into a single, unified platform. Instead of a studio hiring one company to build a game, another to produce a film, and another to create digital content, Arctic7 handles it all.

Arctic7 has worked on content from blockbuster franchises like Star Wars and Marvel. And it has collaborations with Disney, Microsoft, and Riot Games’ Hypixel Studios.

its founding team worked at gaming-giant Electronic Arts and started Sperasoft, a game-development business that was acquired in 2017 by Keywords Studios.

Arctic7 is targeting a big industry here. Between gaming, movie, and virtual/augmented reality, the entertainment industry is projected to be worth a trillion dollars by 2032. And Arctic7 believes the timing is right to target this industry.

More than half of Gen Z and millennials play a video game after watching a related TV show or film. Studios are responding by adopting game technology for film production. And this shift is accelerating across the entertainment industry. Game engines now power film and TV production, while franchises increasingly launch across multiple platforms simultaneously to meet audience expectations.

Below are a few recent notable examples of franchises that achieved success across multiple platforms:

The Witcher — Netflix's series drove significant renewed interest in CD Projekt's game franchise, bringing new players to titles released years earlier and expanding the audience far beyond gaming.

Cyberpunk 2077 — The anime series Edgerunners generated a surge in player activity, with concurrent player counts jumping significantly and the game re-entering sales charts months after its original launch.

Fallout — Amazon Prime's series premiere drove a resurgence in players across the entire game franchise, with older titles seeing renewed sales and active player counts reaching all-time highs.

League of Legends — Riot Games' Arcane on Netflix introduced millions of non-gamers to the franchise, expanding the audience while deepening engagement with existing players through coordinated in-game events.

The Last of Us — HBO's adaptation drove significant sales of the original PlayStation titles years after release, proving that well-executed transmedia can extend franchise lifecycles and reach new demographics.

Star Wars — Decades of coordinated storytelling across films, games, books, and streaming have built one of the most valuable entertainment properties in history.

Arctic7 has generated more than twenty million dollars in lifetime revenue. It does so through various services. For example, studios, publishers, and brands pay the company to develop games, produce content, and support digital production.

The startup has two projects underway — a pair of anime-to-live-action pieces — and more than sixty million dollars’ worth of active deals in its pipeline. Arctic7 aims to expand to Eastern Europe and in Canada.

Team Background

Igor Efremov - CEO & Board Member

Prior to Arctic7, Efremov co-founded Sperasoft, a game development studio that grew into a major co-development partner for AAA publishers before being acquired by Keywords Studios for approximately $27 million. At Sperasoft, he played a key leadership role in scaling operations and delivering high-profile game development services to global clients.

Earlier in his career, Efremov held roles at gaming company Electronic Arts (EA), where he worked on large-scale game production initiatives and built experience inside one of the industry’s most prominent publishers.

He earned a Master’s degree in History from Yakutsk State University.

Mark Rizzo - Chief Operations Officer

Mark brings more than three decades of leadership experience in technology, including nearly two decades in executive roles within gaming and digital entertainment.

Prior to Arctic7, Mark served as Chief Operating Officer and Chief Technology Officer at Sperasoft from 2013 to 2018. There, he helped scale the company into a leading co-development partner for AAA game publishers before its acquisition by Keywords Studios.

Before Sperasoft, he held senior executive roles across several major gaming companies, including serving as Senior Vice President of Technology Operations at Trion Worlds from 2011 to 2013 and Executive Vice President of Technology at NCsoft from 2010 to 2011.

Earlier in his career, Mark spent several years at Sony, including time at Sony Online Entertainment, where he held roles such as Vice President of Technology and Infrastructure and Vice President of Operations between 2007 and 2010.

He also served as Vice President of Operations and Platform Engineering at Perpetual Entertainment beginning in 2003, where he focused on building large-scale online gaming infrastructure.

He studied at the University of Texas at Austin.

Andrew MacLusky - Chief Production Officer

Andrew has twenty-three years of experience across gaming and film/TV.

He previously worked at gaming companies Rockstar Games and Meta. He also founded Narwhal Studios, a company focused on media creation and IP development.

He completed visual-effects work for gaming-company Lucasfilm, and maintains key industry relationships with Disney, Marvel, Amazon, and Netflix.

Andrew earned a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Columbia University.

Co-Investors