Case study: How Stardust helped The Control App build for mainstream scale and engage web3 natives

The Control App from Fan Controlled Sports (FCS), creators of Fan Controlled Football, powers a series of groundbreaking sports and entertainment experiences which put the user in the drivers’ seat. Available on Android and iOS, Control offers all manner of new ways to interact with sporting events – including Fan Controlled Football Season 3 – such as Fanvatars, a customizable online identity, and Pick ‘Em Leaderboards where users can win awesome exclusive prizes. 

May 2024 ushered in a new era for The Control App as it relaunched with Stardust’s Wallets-as-a-Service integrated, positioning it for mainstream scale and the monetization and retention benefits that only web3 can bring. The launch saw 20k wallets created by users, 90% of whom are categorized as mainstream ‘web2’ users, while the app saw a 10x uplift in average revenue per user (ARPU) among web3 natives. 

‍

The Challenge

Built on FCS’ purpose-built L2 Victory Chain, Control’s ultimate goal is to bring the 3.5 billion-strong professional sports fanbase on-chain. With the CTRL token’s launch on Victory Chain, along with launches of Fan Controlled Cricket and Golf, it was vital for FCS to perfect its backend architecture and facilitate the enormous scaling it aims to achieve:

• With the ultimate goal of bringing the sports fans of the world on-chain, Control needs to appeal to the wider mainstream community of sports fans as well as onboard web3 natives
• Equally important is the scalability and performance of the app. If legions of users are constantly engaging in real-time sporting events, a robust infrastructure is vital in order to support millions of wallet creations and signatures per minute
• As well as attracting users, FCS needs to engage and retain them once on Control – particularly the highest-value players

What Stardust Did

Stardust Wallets-as-a-Service (WaaS) was the clear frontrunner for FCS’ multilateral needs. Being completely invisible, web2 users are not lost due to a cumbersome sign-up process – Stardust takes care of all of it. WaaS is also production-ready, and can already handle the level of wallet creations and signatures that Control expects to require, catering to the bursts in activity brought on by real-time interactions of live sports

As well as WaaS, Control leverages Stardust’s Profiles for on-chain insights which go deeper than any existing player analytics, ensuring high-value web3 players are kept engaged and hungry to come back for more. 

“We were impressed with the seamless onboarding process for web2 users and easy-to-integrate API.” - Ian Peacock, Head of Product, FCS

‍

The Impact

Ahead of the app’s official launch, Stardust WaaS and Profiles helped round out FCS’ backend architecture for scaling and growing Control on Victory Chain. 

Post-launch, Stardust has continued to support FCS in its acquisition, onboarding and retention of a diverse mix of players, while maintaining the performance and speed required for them to engage instantly with live sports. With a balancing act required between web2 and web3 users, Stardust was able to bridge this gap and allow all sports fans to get involved in the action.

• Time to value: Integrating Stardust took less than 2 days, decreasing required dev hours and allowing FCS to focus on their strengths
• Broader Audience Appeal: 90% of Control’s 20k newly onboarded users are categorized as web2, showcasing the ease with which they have been able to sign up and get started
• Powering revenue: Control’s ability to attract, cater to and understand web3 natives enabled them to experience a 10x ARPU uplift among those users, when compared to web2 users

Bringing 3.5 billion sports fans on-chain may be a stretch target, but the scalable infrastructure to welcome them is now in place. Our bet is that the groundbreaking sports and entertainment experiences made possible by The Control App and Victory Chain will continue to advance the SportsFi space.