US company Razer, known the world over to gamers, has acquired the assets of Israeli startup StreamElements. Razer’s laptops, screens, headphones, keyboards, and even chairs are used by heavy-duty gamers.
StreamElements was one of the fastest growing startups in the country during the Covid pandemic, attracting senior institutional investors and venture capital funds but the market changes brought it to a standstill. The company had raised $115 million from investors including SoftBank, Menora Mivtachim, Mivtach Shamir, Rainfall of Yitzhak Mirilashvili and Ron Rofe’s Rainfall Ventures, Leon Recanati’s Glenrock, Pitango and State of Mind, according to PitchBook.
The sale price was not disclosed, but it is estimated to be in the tens of millions of dollars and is seen as a loss-making sale by investors, according to a senior official close to the company. Dozens of StreamElements more than 40 employees will move to Razer, and the US company will invest in further developing the network and bringing in its own advertisers - so that StreamElements will continue to exist, albeit in a different format. According to estimates, the gaming company collaborates with brands such as Pokemon, Dolce & Gabbana, and Lexus.
Innovative economic model
The platform acquired by Razer from StreamElements is designed for content creators on streaming networks - mainly influencers who record themselves playing video games and broadcast to a loyal community that follows them. It has become one of the largest in the field due to its free model: users can broadcast as much as they want through it, and only pay it when they recruit sponsorships or sell products through the platform.
The economic model, initially presented as an innovation during the Covid pandemic, transformed StreamElements into an overnight success story: Covid left billions confined to their homes, and the number of broadcasters on the platform jumped from 700,000 at the end of 2020 to 1.2 million at the end of 2021, in what was defined as its biggest year of growth since its inception. Today, the network manages tens of millions of broadcasters and is considered the largest in the world in its field.
In 2021, at the height of its boom, the company raised $100 million in a huge round led by SoftBank's Vision Fund 2, with participation from Israeli institutional and venture capital funds. The company flourished, hiring dozens of employees. In those years, it came to public attention due to two of its founders, Reem Sherman and Doron Nir, who publicized it on their successful podcast, Geekonomy.
Reality has changed"
But something was still amiss. In the years that followed, the company embarked on a number of layoffs, cutbacks, and frequent management changes that ultimately ended with the fire sale. The company, which employed 220 people at its peak, carried layoffs between 2022 and 2025, and currently employs a little more than 40 employees, only a handful of them in Israel.
Executives in the gaming market who are familiar with the company's activities explain, "The rug was pulled out from under its feet, and in fact changed the reality around it from end to end. The market on which it depended never proved itself economically, and in practice it was difficult to rely on it for long-term growth."
The company based its revenue on partnerships in sponsorships and ads in two main markets: mobile games and food deliveries - two markets that grew greatly during Covid and have shrunk in recent years.
In the gaming sector, StreamElements signed a partnership with a major publisher - gaming company Plarium, which was founded in Israel and sold in 2017 to an Australian company. "It was a big deal for StreamElements, and it gave hope that the company would sign agreements with other game producers like Playtika, which ultimately did not happen in the way they expected," says a senior gaming market executive. "The mobile gaming market has declined dramatically since 2022, probably due to the rise of stories and reels that capture more of the users' attention, and its advertising budgets have shrunk or been diverted elsewhere."
SteamElements also signed partnerships with food delivery companies, the main with Germany’s Hello Fresh, but also with several US brands. "Gaming broadcasters filmed themselves cooking, while food influencers broadcast video games. The company figured out a way to promote these areas through each other," says a senior executive in the gaming market who knows the company.
"But the money stopped flowing to the delivery companies, food prices rose and the companies’ marketing budgets were reduced or diverted to TikTok and Instagram. At its peak, Hello Fresh was valued at €3 billion and is now worth perhaps €500 million - a rather low valuation considering its sales of €7.6 billion a year."
SteamElements cofounder Or Perry, who became its CEO in recent years, had founded the company to allow influencers to produce revenue from their game broadcasts, and relied heavily on Amazon's Twitch streaming platform. However, over the years, Twitch's position has weakened: the return to routine after Covid significantly reduced its dwell and viewing times, and in practice it has never been profitable - Amazon was required to inject huge budgets into it.
The migration of broadcasters and viewers to other platforms such as YouTube and especially TikTok has weakened Twitch, as has a well-publicized dispute between it and its broadcasters over revenue sharing. Rounds of layoffs initiated by Amazon have also eroded Twitch's power in recent years, and as a result have also hurt StreamElements.
"It is very difficult to sustain a company that derives revenue from the broadcasters' share of sponsorships and merchandise sales," says a senior executive in the video game industry. "The ones who brings in the money are the heavy broadcasters, who are not in large numbers and advertisers reach them directly, skipping over the platforms."
Effort to preserve the community In recent months, StreamElements has made a supreme effort to preserve its community and prevent user abandonment. On one occasion, the Gamesbit website reported, an employee at the company who was involved in managing sponsorships informed customers, creators and influencers of the company's possible closure, while on another occasion the company issued a call to its broadcasters to help it in its survival efforts.
According to estimates, the company negotiated its acquisition and looked for a home that could preserve the influencer network, promote it in the future and pay the highest possible amount to investors. Investors left with their losses and the clear lesson that what rises and grows in a few months due to a global pandemic can also fall just as quickly.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on August 5, 2026.
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