Former Ticketmaster exec Nathan Hubbard recently announced plans to take on the ticketing giant with the formation of a brand new company he’s calling Rival. The Los Angeles-based startup has raised more than $30 million in venture capital over the last 18 months.
The company’s backers include Andreessen Horowitz, Upfront Ventures as well as a number of Silicon Valley execs like former Twitter CEO Dick Costolo, Slack product chief April Underwood, and Stripe co-founders Patrick and John Collison.The investor list also allegedly includes some undisclosed teams from each major U.S. sports league as well as soccer’s English Premier League, according to Recode.
Essentially, the company’s software will be geared toward helping teams and arenas manage ticket sales, customer relationships, and security, something Hubbard feels is a top priority.
Rival will utilize a third-party distribution system to sell tickets, and is also looking at facial recognition “to bolster security and identify those entering the building.”
Right now it doesn’t look like Rival’s first customers will get their hands on the software until 2019. As for Hubbard’s hopes to go up against his former employer and shake up the ticketing industry, we’ll see.