Former Cisco employee launches DAO to buy Denver Broncos

The next owners of the Broncos could be a humble DAO organized by a group of professionals who may wind up paying the most ever for a North American sports team.

A new decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) has been formed to raise money in an effort to purchase the Denver Broncos U.S. National Football League team for around $4 billion.

BuyTheBroncos DAO aims to give fans a chance to own a piece of the team no matter their level of wealth. One of the organizers of the DAO, former Cisco employee Sean O’Brien, told CNBC on Feb. 19 that:

“The purpose essentially is to establish an infrastructure so that fans from all walks of life can be owners of the Denver Broncos.”

If it succeeds, it would join the Green Bay Packers among NFL teams owned by the fans. Fans looking to own a stake of the Broncos through the DAO could contribute as little as they like, as opposed to the $300 per share for the Packers.

Members of the DAO who contribute Ether (ETH) to purchase the team will be issued a nonfungible token (NFT) that BuyTheBroncos.com says “will double as your ‘membership card’ that grants you access to the cooperative.”

BuyTheBroncos currently has a number of professionals among its 630 Twitter followers, including attorneys, accountants, software developers, professional athletes, and a mathematician.

Fan. Owned. Denver. Broncos.

Many thanks to the amazing @KenzieSigalos for the article on @CNBC.

And thank you @GovofCO for the support! CO’s ULCAA is the secret weapon to making this happen. https://t.co/IYvY7rJcRk#buythebroncos #denverbroncos #broncoscountry

— BuyTheBroncos (@BuyTheBroncos) February 19, 2022

Trustees of the team have expressed some urgency in shifting ownership over to a new party before the start of the 2022 season, but there will be no discount for the buyer. ESPN expects the team to sell for $4 billion, making it the highest price for a North American sports team in history.

It is unclear whether NFL commissioner Roger Goodell would allow a DAO to own and operate a team.

Related: $53 million raised for Assange showed the power of DAOs

A DAO gives relatively smaller investors the opportunity to pool their funds together to make a large investment as a single entity. This tactic was attempted with Constitution DAO, which attempted to buy a first-edition print of the US Constitution. It raised $47 million from 17,437 contributors but came up short at auction.

DAOs have also been used recently to aid crowdfunding efforts such as the recent Freedom Convoy movement in Canada.