For Subscribers

One Young Entrepreneur's Million-Dollar Idea in Mobile Gaming A Princeton dropout makes waves with mobile gaming and payment services.

By Joel Holland

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

High score: Seth Priebatsch wins big with Scvngr.
High score: Seth Priebatsch wins big with Scvngr.
Photo© Webb Chappell

In the fall of 2007, Seth Priebatsch was a freshman at Princeton. A year later, he dropped out. By 2011, he was head of a company valued at nine figures.

The 23-year-old is the self-proclaimed "chief ninja" of Scvngr, a real-world, location-based gaming system, and its new mobile payment service, LevelUp. Priebatsch's record of entrepreneurship stems back to high school, when he ran a print manufacturing startup called Postcard Tech. He cut his teeth turning out college applications while managing factory operations in Hong Kong and a distribution center in Boston.

At Princeton, Priebatsch turned his attention to another field: gaming. "I really started getting fascinated with how much I and everyone else in the engineering department enjoyed games," he says, "but I also enjoyed actually going outside."

Motivated to move game mechanics from their traditional hardware into the tangible world, Priebatsch enlisted the help of a professor to build a demo of a mobile gaming platform to which anyone could contribute. The demo won the school's business plan competition and earned Priebatsch an invite to DreamIt Ventures' Philadelphia incubator.

There, he began fortifying the system, which he dubbed Scvngr. "It's a reality-based mobile game," he explains. Players check in at locations and undertake challenges--puzzles to solve, location-based photos to snap--for points that lead to awards. Players, companies and institutions can add their own locations and challenges to the system, so it is "built by people like you … You unlock awards and access those places, whether it's half off your coffee at a business or something cool at the Smithsonian Institute."

With his increased commitment to his new business, Priebatsch decided to put Princeton on hold. "People think that running a startup while in school is actually an option and a recipe for success, and it's just not," he says. "If you want to be a big startup while you're in school, you'll either end up failing as a startup and failing at school or doing OK at school but the startup is going to, for lack of better terms, be on "forced hold' until the time that you graduate or decide to go at it full time."

Priebatsch moved his project to Boston and secured a $750,000 initial investment from Highland Capital Partners. In December 2009, the company raised $4 million in financing from Google Ventures. In January 2011, a valuation of $100 million helped Scvngr secure another $15 million in a financing round led by Balderton Capital. Scvngr has attracted 2 million users and 5,000 large enterprises since its launch.

With the new funding, Priebatsch turned his sights to the LevelUp mobile project. He originally conceived it as a location-based daily deal platform but soon scrapped that idea in favor of a QR code payment service for the iPhone and Android, distinguishable from other such services by its built-in loyalty programs. By signing up and downloading a free app, users get a unique code they link to a credit or debit card and carry on their phone; when they scan the code at participating retailers, they earn credit that can be redeemed during future visits. LevelUp attracted 100,000 users in a 12-week pilot and is now available in four cities.

Flush with his blooming success, Priebatsch has no regrets about his decision to leave school and focus on business. "The choice to drop out isn't actually as big a choice as it sounds," he says. "If Scvngr had not worked, I would have been able to go back a year later or a semester later. And the absolute worst-case scenario would have been to have spent a year on an incredible experience learning a huge amount of stuff and really taking a huge risk."

Joel Holland, 25, is the founder and CEO of Footage Firm in Reston, Va.

Want to be an Entrepreneur Leadership Network contributor? Apply now to join.

Science & Technology

How AI Can Free Up Your Time For Less Busywork and More Innovation

If there's one trait every founder needs, it's a willingness to experiment. Today, experimentation is easier and more accessible than ever thanks to AI.

Business News

Here Are the 10 Highest-Paying Jobs with the Lowest Risk of Being Replaced By AI: 'Safest Jobs Right Now'

A new report from career resources platform Resume Genius finds the top 10 AI-proof careers expected to see the most growth within the next decade.

Making a Change

Learn Up to 56 Languages for Just $35

Get lifetime access to the platform that turns language learning into a game.

Business Ideas

70 Small Business Ideas to Start in 2025

We put together a list of the best, most profitable small business ideas for entrepreneurs to pursue in 2025.

Science & Technology

How I Went From Side Hustle to 7 Figures Using These 4 AI Tools (No Tech Skills Needed)

Scale faster, work less and grow a 7-figure business — no team needed.

Real Estate

Why Buying a 'Second Home' First is the New Way to Build Wealth — and Enjoy Free Vacations

The dream of owning a home has never felt more out of reach. So, a growing number of aspiring homeowners are making an unconventional choice.