eSports Startups funded by Y Combinator (YC) 2026

TL;DR: PokerClubHub is the first licensed poker club platform. We protect players’ deposits and allow anyone to open their own poker club and make money. Regulated online poker sites like PokerStars have open player pools and thus are full of pros and bots, driving players to unregulated private clubs. Existing poker club platforms like ClubGG have no payments processing. Players deposit with a club owner by sending them crypto for play-money chips. In theory, these chips can be exchanged back for money. However, players can get scammed and withdrawing takes ages. This model is also broken for honest club owners who have to manually process hundreds of deposits a day. They lose out on rake when they sleep and struggle to get players to trust them. On PokerClubhub, players deposit with PokerClubHub, not the club owner. We handle all deposits and withdrawals for the club owner, saving them time and increasing their earnings. We pay the rake (if any) to club owners as affiliate fees. We hold the same gaming license as BetHog (built by founders of FanDuel) and Nexa Poker (part of World Poker Tour). Player deposits are secured using Fireblocks. You can also play rake-free games with your friends and acquaintances on our platform. We ensure that everyone pays up.

Blitz Esports is a tech and media startup focused on bridging the gap between esports fandom and personal gameplay. We're one of the premier media publications in esports, specializing in educational video content for League of Legends, CS:GO and Overwatch. We've also developed the first fully automatic League of Legends coaching app, which uses computer vision and data-driven insights to proactively help gamers make better decisions at each step of their gameplay experience. A month into open beta, the Blitz app is now used in over a million games each week.