“With Web3, you own. Protocols exist to own your identity. You will be able to take it with you wherever you want. That is interoperability, decentralization.”
Nicole Muniz joined Yuga Labs, creator of the Bored Ape Yacht Club nonfungible token collection, as CEO after having worked as a producer at JWT, followed by a stint at B-Reel, where she managed accounts such as Google. At B-Reel, Muniz pivoted the firm from being a digital production company to a brand partner delivering strategic communication. She later opened her own creative agency, Something New, where she was the founder and managing director, working with the likes of EA and Nike.
Muniz was brought on as the CEO of Yuga Labs during the final quarter of 2021 by Wylie Aronow, a co-founder of the company. She was named to the “Fortune 40 Under 40” list in 2022, owing to the impactful work she led and executed with the team at Yuga Labs and BAYC. Muniz will be moving to a strategic advisory position at Yuga Labs in 2023, lending her support to the newly appointed CEO, and she is still expected to make an impact in the industry.
Muniz is one of the most influential women in tech and Web3. She oversaw considerable strategic initiatives at Yuga Labs during a strenuous winter for the Web3 ecosystem. Under Muniz’s tenure as CEO, Yuga Labs and BAYC have become household names, as BAYC collectibles have become synonymous with NFTs worldwide. She was also instrumental in acquiring two other popular NFT collections, CryptoPunks and Meebits. Yuga also brought Beeple’s Web3 ecosystem Wenew and its bellwether NFT project 10KTF under its wing.
Furthermore, Yuga Labs raised one of the highest funding rounds from many top venture capital firms at $450 million. With significant capital backing the firm, she also oversaw the launch of The Otherside, BAYC’s own metaverse platform. In doing so, Muniz raised the lore and cemented the future vision of BAYC, setting the stage for her successor. Yuga Labs’ 2022 will also be remembered for launching ApeCoin, a token that rallied to a multibillion-dollar market cap on its first day of trading.
Despite battling the bear market and having instigated several new initiatives, Muniz hopes to have strategically positioned Yuga Labs for exponential growth. In Q4 2022, Yuga announced that Muniz would be replaced by Activision president and chief operating officer Daniel Alegre in the first quarter of the year. The firm was seeking someone from the traditional gaming industry to take over from Muniz, but she will don the hat of partner and strategic adviser for Yuga after the transition. With several new initiatives in the pipeline for Yuga Labs — such as Dookey Dash, Second Trip and avatars — Muniz’s role may prove crucial for Yuga Labs’ growth.
Yuga Labs marked 2022 with over $300 million in revenue from Otherside sales. The Second Trip initiative, set to launch in March 2023, is expected to tap into the metaverse narrative and leverage the ape NFTs as avatars that users can relate to. Otherside SDKs are also being opened up to developers and creators so that they can create custom experiences on their Otherside plots.
Several in-game building tools are being created to empower creators and developers who can help the ecosystem grow exponentially and achieve the much coveted “network effect” in a metaverse.
