Gaming cafe chain Friendly Fire closes a US$4.7 million Series A

Friendly Fire, a chain of gaming and esports cafes founded in Zagreb, has closed a Series A funding round with AYMO Ventures, a venture capital firm based in the same city. The company's English-language announcement, issued on August 26, 2026, puts the round at US$4.7 million. Bloomberg Adria, which reported the deal a day earlier in Croatian, gave it as €4 million.

A Series A is usually the first large round a young company raises from professional investors, after its founders and early backers. Neither report gives the valuation, the share of the company AYMO now holds or the names of any other investors, as The Esports Advocate noted on August 26.

Friendly Fire's announcement of August 26, 2026; company-reported figures.

Two figures for one round

The announcement says the capital is planned to support ongoing operations and the development of the company's technology platform. Bloomberg Adria's report adds two more uses: international expansion and support for franchise partners.

The two amounts are close. The Esports Advocate converted the €4 million at the European Central Bank's reference rate of August 26 and arrived at about US$4.67 million, within rounding of the company's own figure.

Friendly Fire's Croatian operating company, Friendly Fire d.o.o., is wholly owned by Friendly Fire, Inc., a corporation registered in Delaware, according to The Esports Advocate.

Who is investing

AYMO Ventures is the first institutional backer the company has disclosed, according to The Esports Advocate. The firm reached a first close of €52 million across two funds in July 2025, and its growth fund writes checks from €300,000 to €5 million and above. The European Commission lists it among the financial intermediaries backed by the European Union, and its portfolio is mostly software and artificial intelligence companies, the outlet reports.

In its own words, as quoted in the announcement, AYMO's interest lies in a market it describes as fragmented and local, and in a team that has proved its model at its own locations.

The cafe chain already had a name from the competitive scene in its ownership. Perkz, the League of Legends player who spent most of his career at G2 Esports and retired from professional play in 2025, joined the ownership group on December 2, 2025, The Esports Advocate reported that day. The deal made him a co-owner and an ambassador for the brand, with a role in its marketing and on his social media channels; the financial terms and the size of his commitment were not disclosed. The funding announcement of August 26 does not mention him.

Kosir, for his part, said in the announcement that the company now has the wind at its back and everything it needs to deliver its vision. He also tied the franchise offer to processes the company says it has refined over years at its own venues.

What Friendly Fire runs

Friendly Fire was founded in Zagreb in 2017 by David Kosir, its chief executive, and a group of gaming enthusiasts. A standard venue covers about 1,500 square feet with about 50 high-end gaming stations, according to the company's US franchise plan as reported by The Esports Advocate in January. Its venues combine gaming equipment, social space and a calendar of amateur tournaments, a model that Bloomberg Adria likens to the neighborhood gaming cafes and LAN parties of the 1990s, where players gathered to play on a shared local network in the same room. Bloomberg Adria frames the idea against the size of video games, which it calls the largest entertainment industry in the world, bigger than film and music combined, and against the fact that players have less and less reason to leave home to play together. Kosir has put the same idea in fewer words: "People want to play together." Since 2022, the company has grown mainly through franchising, Bloomberg Adria reports: independent operators pay to open venues under the brand and follow its standards.

The announcement counts 22 company- and franchise-owned locations in six countries, more than 220,000 gamers on the Friendly Fire platform and more than 1,000 amateur esports tournaments hosted to date. The company's own web pages give lower counts in places, The Esports Advocate found: 20 locations and five countries on the homepage, and 150,000 users. The locations page lists Austria, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cyprus, the Netherlands and the United States.

The count has grown step by step. When Perkz joined in December 2025, the company claimed more than 18 cafes open and operating and said it would soon launch in the United States, The Esports Advocate reported then; Kosir gave Bloomberg Adria a figure of 21 the same month. On January 5, 2026, when it announced its plan to enter the United States, the company said it had grown to 20 cafes across Europe since launching its franchise model in 2022. A franchise trade publication reported 22 on January 23, 2026, the number the August announcement still uses.

In June 2026, Friendly Fire was named Croatia's Franchise of the Year by the Croatian Association for Franchise Business and Poslovni FM Group.

The accounts behind the brand

The Croatian operating company files public accounts. Their figures are modest next to the size of the round and of the pipeline, and they cover only that entity, not the Delaware parent or the franchised venues run by other owners.

Revenue rose in each year, to just under €1 million: up about 109% from 2023 to 2024, then about 33% from 2024 to 2025. Net profit swung from €181,072 to €210 and back to €136,990. Set against the round, the €4 million reported by Bloomberg Adria is about four times the entity's 2025 revenue. The business register classes the company as a micro enterprise, and its listed main activity is the leasing of computers and office equipment, according to The Esports Advocate.

The franchise pipeline

The growth plan rests on franchise partners. The announcement counts 31 signed franchise agreements, which together cover 178 additional locations in 11 countries. Earlier in 2026, in January and June, the company had cited more than 200 franchises in development across the United Kingdom, Austria, Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland and Spain, The Esports Advocate reports.

In May 2025, the company signed a master franchise, the right to develop the brand across a territory, for 100 units in the United Kingdom, Spain, Poland and Ukraine. The partner was an operator group with experience of Domino's Pizza outlets, and the deal's value was estimated at €10 million to €15 million. None of the four markets has a Friendly Fire location yet, according to the outlet. Andrii Romanenko, who led that group, has joined Friendly Fire as chief business development officer. In December 2025, Kosir also described a Benelux agreement for at least 25 locations.

The two levels of franchise work differently. A unit franchisee opens and runs one venue under the brand. A master franchisee buys the right to develop a whole territory, opening venues itself or signing further franchisees, which is why a single master agreement can carry dozens or a hundred planned units.

Opening one venue costs roughly US$218,400 to US$390,685, including a franchise fee of US$49,500, according to the US franchise plan reported by The Esports Advocate.

In the United States, the company named Texas and Florida as its first states on January 5, 2026, without a timeline, a partner or a number of units at the time. It is now also considering Boston, The Esports Advocate reports. Kosir has said only multi-unit operators, partners able to open several venues, will be accepted there. The Esports Advocate notes that it has not reviewed a Franchise Rule disclosure document for Friendly Fire, the document a franchisor prepares for prospective US franchisees. The first US venue is expected in the fourth quarter of 2026; none has opened. The same US partner holds the master franchise for Canada.

Earlier venue chains in Europe and the United States

Gaming venue chains have tried to scale before. Kappa Bar acquired Meltdown Bars in March 2022 to form Kappa Meltdown Group, with 28 locations in seven countries and a target of 100 venues by 2027, The Esports Advocate recalls. The French Meltdown company stopped paying its debts on August 29, 2023, entered restructuring on October 4, 2023 and was placed in liquidation on March 27, 2024. A separate company running a Meltdown venue in Lyon had been liquidated in July 2023.

In the United States, Belong Gaming Arenas ceased its US operations in July 2023 and laid off most of its American staff, according to the same outlet.

The round is counted in millions; the plan it supports is counted in venues that franchise partners still have to open.

What comes next

Bloomberg Adria's report names the next steps: a round of openings and a nomination in Brussels. Three venues are scheduled to open at the same time on September 4, 2026, in Limassol in Cyprus, Rijeka in Croatia and Vienna, according to The Esports Advocate.

On September 17, 2026, Friendly Fire will be one of five finalists for International Brand of the Year at the European Franchise Awards in Brussels, alongside 5 à SEC, Fortidia, Japanese Head Spa and Reitan Retail.

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