Prince Thomas, Ranjit Kumar Behera, and Ajith Sunny, three Malayali entrepreneurs, founded MetaShot in 2021 in Bengaluru. Their patent-pending MetaShot Smart Bat tracks real-world cricket shots and mirrors them on screen, creating India's first console-like cricket experience. The brand recorded 5 million-plus matches, raised ₹11 crore in seed funding, secured ₹1.6 crore on Shark Tank India Season 4, clocked 115% revenue growth in FY26, and launched the world's first Smart Pickleball Paddle in May 2026.
COVID, Gully Cricket Bats, and the Idea That Changed Indian Gaming
MetaShot was founded in 2021 in Bengaluru by three Malayali entrepreneurs: Prince Thomas as CEO, Ranjit Kumar Behera as COO, and Ajith Sunny as co-founder, operating under Gillidanda Tech Private Limited. The idea emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic when Prince, an avid cricket enthusiast, began exploring how physical cricket could be merged with virtual gameplay.
Before MetaShot, the three founders had started a company making bats for gully cricket. That experience gave them foundational knowledge of cricket equipment design, manufacturing, and the grassroots passion for the sport across India. The leap from gully cricket bats to smart bats was driven by one insight:
India has the most cricket-loving population in the world, but the global gaming industry had consistently underserved them with low-quality mobile games and no console-level experience tailored to physical play.
The earliest prototype, a cricket bat with a sensor connected to EA Cricket 2007, proved the concept immediately. The physical sensation of actually swinging a bat and watching the shot translate into on-screen gameplay was unlike anything Indian gamers had experienced. Development began in earnest.
Patent-Pending Sensor Technology, 60 Million Views, and 500 Bats in 10 Days
The boldest product decision MetaShot made was to build entirely proprietary, homegrown sensor technology rather than licensing existing gaming hardware.
Product Specifications & Launch Success
The Technology: The MetaShot Smart Bat uses a patent-pending sensor that tracks real-world cricket shots and translates them into virtual gameplay mirrored on a TV screen via a connected mobile device.
Platform Support: Android, iOS, and Windows platforms.
Pricing: Priced at ₹7,999, available at ₹5,999 after discount, making console-quality sports gaming genuinely accessible for the first time in India.
Viral Marketing: When MetaShot launched in September 2023, a single high-quality promotional video generated nearly 60 million views on YouTube Shorts and 16 million views on Instagram.
Initial Demand: The first lot of 500 units sold out in 10 days.
Early Revenue Trajectory
Q4 2023 (First Quarter): ₹1.76 crore
Q1 2024: ₹1.13 crore
Q2 2024: ₹2.8 crore
Q3 2024: ₹2.5 crore
First-Year Volume: Total deliveries crossed 18,000 smart bats within the first year of launch.
The Shark Tank India Moment: A Live Cricket Session With the Sharks
MetaShot appeared on Shark Tank India Season 4, entering with a pitch of ₹80 lakh for 1.5% equity at a ₹53.33 crore valuation. What followed was one of the most memorable pitch demonstrations of the season: the founders invited the Sharks to play a live cricket game using the MetaShot bat on stage, turning the pitch into an experience rather than a presentation.
Following the live cricket session, Anupam Mittal and Vineeta Singh stepped forward with an offer of ₹1.6 crore for 5% equity, valuing MetaShot at ₹32 crore. Vineeta also advised the founders to position the product not just as a gaming device but as a fitness tool, significantly expanding its addressable market. The deal was accepted.
Funding and Investment Milestones
The Shark Tank appearance was followed by MetaShot's largest funding milestone:
January 2025: The company raised ₹11 crore in a seed round from Sauce.vc, Panthera Peak Capital, and Sharrp Ventures.
June 2025: KITVEN, Karnataka's state government alternative investment fund, invested ₹2 crore through convertible debentures.
Total Funding: Stands at $2.21 million across nine rounds from 61 investors.
Expanding Beyond Cricket: World's First Smart Pickleball Paddle
The most significant development of 2026 is also the boldest signal of MetaShot's long-term ambitions. In May 2026, MetaShot launched the world's first Smart Pickleball Paddle, opening its proprietary motion gaming platform to external game development studios for the first time.
Yudiz Solutions, an NSE-listed game development company, partnered with MetaShot as the first external studio on the platform, co-developing the pickleball title and completing the integration at extraordinary speed.
Future Roadmap
Developer Funding Programme: A new pipeline designed to attract more studios, leading to more sports titles and motion-gaming innovation across tennis, football, badminton, and beyond.
Universal Motion-Tracking Device: A device currently in development that allows users to switch between multiple sports by simply changing attachments, dramatically broadening the addressable market.
"The cricket title proved the model works. Pickleball is the first proof that others can build on top of it, fast, seamlessly, and at global scale," said CEO Prince Thomas.
MetaShot Growth Metrics and Market Scale
| Metric Category | Performance Details |
| Total Completed Matches | 5 million-plus matches (up from the 1 million milestone) |
| Year-on-Year Revenue Growth | 115% growth in FY26 |
| Daily Active Users (DAU) | 800 users |
| Weekly Active Users (WAU) | 2,300 users |
| Monthly Active Users (MAU) | 6,000 users |
| User Engagement | 35-minute average session; 40% of users play over 60 minutes |
| Brand Partnerships | Britannia, Wrogn, and Tata Capital |
| Distribution Channels | Amazon, Flipkart, Blinkit, Swiggy Instamart, and offline retail |
| Founders' Stake & Net Worth | 59.99% equity with a combined net worth of ₹31.4 crore (as of March 2025) |
| 5-Year Vision | Targets ₹250 crore revenue and 50 lakh families reached |
Global and Domestic Gaming Market Outlook
Bottom Line: Solving an Emotional Need for Cricket Lovers
The sharpest lesson from MetaShot's journey is this: the best consumer products in the world solve an emotional need, not just a functional one.
Every Indian who has ever played cricket in a gully, on a rooftop, or in a colony parking lot has felt the same thing: the satisfaction of a perfectly timed shot. MetaShot bottled that feeling, brought it into the living room at ₹5,999, proved the model with 5 million matches, and is now opening the platform to the world.
"We've already seen over 8 lakh matches on MetaShot, showing the strong customer interest in our innovative gaming experience. Our goal is to create a platform that blends the physical and virtual worlds through a range of diverse games," Prince Thomas says.
A pirated copy of EA Cricket 2007. A bat with a sensor. A pandemic. A viral video with 60 million views. Five million matches. One hundred and fifteen percent revenue growth. The world's first Smart Pickleball Paddle. And a vision to build the global infrastructure for motion sports gaming from Bengaluru. They started with a borrowed idea and a sensor—now they are building a gaming empire.
Sources: TechnoSports, One21 Snapshot, Indian Retailer, Dhanamonline, SiliconIndia, Shark Tank India Club, CBInsights, Tracxn, The Indian Startup Show
