In the glitzy world of entertainment licensing, Nathen Mazri stands out as a visionary entrepreneur. His latest brainchild, Egeez, is revolutionizing the marketplace for entertainment intellectual properties. This innovative platform connects official licensees and passionate fans, enabling thousands of globally verified licensees to sell coveted entertainment merch to billions of fans, each meticulously geolocated per licensed territory, which also fights counterfeits, always at unbeatable prices. Your one-stop place for quick mobile licensing (QML) – but this isn’t Mazri’s first rodeo in the realm of licensing marvels. He’s the mastermind behind GarfieldEATS, a groundbreaking venture that introduced the world to its very first licensed Garfield-themed restaurant. Mazri’s journey from the whimsical world of GarfieldEATS and Scooby-Doo EATS to the cutting-edge Egeez technologies (app & SaaS) exemplifies his relentless pursuit of transforming the licensing landscape.
Embarking on a Garfield-Inspired Culinary Adventure
Nathen Mazri’s trailblazing path in the world of themed dining and technology took off in 2017 with the inception of GarfieldEATS. This pioneering venture emerged from his successful pitch to Jim Davis in Muncie, leading to the birth of the world’s inaugural Garfield-themed restaurant and engaging (Nathen’s word) delivery app. This innovative, officially licensed concept artfully blended Mazri’s fervent admiration for the beloved comic strip character, Garfield with his zeal for culinary excellence. Quickly garnering acclaim among Garfield enthusiasts and food lovers alike, GarfieldEATS showcased Mazri’s ingenious fusion of creativity and entrepreneurial spirit. Nathen later on went to work with Nickelodeon when Paramount Pictures acquired the Garfield IP. That’s when his mind started to expand on the issues of licensing. He felt the pain of licensees!
Tackling the Licensing Industry’s Billion-Dollar Challenge
Thanks to Garfield and Scooby-Doo, Nathen Mazri’s experience at GarfieldEATS and Scooby-Doo EATS was instrumental in unveiling a massive $340 billion conundrum in the licensing sector. He recognized a crucial gap: there wasn’t an effective platform linking fans directly with licensees. This disconnect made acquiring licensed products a cumbersome and often expensive ordeal. Armed with this realization, Nathen embarked on a mission to devise a solution since 2021—a platform specifically designed to bridge this gap, ensuring that fans could easily and affordably access their favorite licensed merchandise and licensees can easily be discovered to the right audience and not only limited to the top 5 giants manufacturers only such as Hasbro and others. Egeez actually solves more than ten problems with amazing new features and it is not just an app, but Nathen declined to comment further.
“There are thousands more of licensees who also pay minimum guarantees and royalties to studios and deserve to equally shine,” Nathen says. .
Securing Funding for a Visionary Venture
Understanding the scope of his ambitious project Egeez and Ai, Nathen Mazri was aware that substantial funding was crucial for its realization. He set a target to secure $4 million in pre-seed capital, a vital step for launching and scaling up the platform. The development of a ready prototype was made possible by the early investment from Fadi (Eddy) El-Masri, co-founder. Nathen’s journey in acquiring this capital sheds light on the intricate dynamics of startup financing and the venture capital landscape. He even met and spoke to two of the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills funny enough, but he says “they are rich made for waste sadly. They don’t get it! Such people never end up solving big problems in the world even if you tried to educate them.”
Nathen even spoke on the phone with Hulk Hogan while Hulk was at the gym. However, Hogan was primarily focused on relishing his recent legal triumph. The jury had held Gawker Media accountable in Hogan’s lawsuit, bestowing upon him, known professionally as Hulk Hogan, a substantial sum of $115 million in compensatory damages and an additional $25 million in punitive damages. “You would think four million is nothing to him, but it’s also about priorities for people,” Nathen says.
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Nathen’s ability to identify and address niche market needs, coupled with his successful capital-raising endeavors, showcases his acumen in navigating the complex world of business, licensing, and technology. Mazri’s crazy character adds a unique anecdote to his story, illustrating the diverse and unexpected events in the life of a serial entrepreneur. Nathen Mazri’s compelling narrative certainly merits a Netflix docu-reality series. With such a fascinating journey, there’s no doubt that a substantial audience would eagerly tune in to watch his story unfold.
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