Disney and Dapper Labs Join Forces to Unveil NFT Platform

Disney has announced a partnership with NBA Top Shot Creator Dapper Labs to launch a “digital pin” NFT platform.

Disney Pinnacle will allow collectors to purchase and trade branded Disney NFTs featuring beloved characters from Pixar and Star Wars on the Flow blockchain.

The initiative seeks to become a “socially driven collectible experience that brings the magic of pin collecting to the digital age,” the companies said in a joint release on Dapper Labs’ website.

“Disney Pinnacle is an all-new product designed from the ground up to incorporate everything we’ve learned over the past few years,” said Roham Gharegozlou, co-founder and CEO of Dapper Labs. “Fans anywhere will be able to collect dynamic pins on their phone and trade instantly and securely with each other no matter where they are in the world.”

Disney Pinnacle is set to make its public debut later this year on the Apple App Store for iOS users. The waitlist is now open for collectors to sign up.

Disney Pinnacle’s digital collectibles will be reminiscent of the physical pins sold at Disney theme parks. These unique digital collectibles will be minted as NFTs on the Flow blockchain, the same blockchain network utilized by Dapper Labs’ other collectibles platforms such as NBA Top Shot and NFL All Day.

During an interview with Decrypt, Gharegozlou also disclosed that iconic characters such as Buzz Lightyear and Woody from Toy Story, the Disney Princesses, and Darth Vader from Star Wars are among those slated to be featured in the lineup of Disney Pinnacle’s digital collectibles.

Although Disney owns the Marvel IP, Gharegozlou clarified that Marvel would not be featured on the platform “at launch.”

Unlike NBA Top Shot, which initially launched on the web before later incorporating a native mobile app, Disney Pinnacle has been designed for mobile use from the ground up. While there may be some resemblances to Dapper’s other NFT platforms, Gharegozlou emphasized that Disney Pinnacle is tailored for smartphones and will feature enhancements to optimize its user-friendly format.

“It’s an updated economy design, so it’s better balanced between the accessibility for the everyday fan as well as the limited edition and super limited edition assets for some of the higher-end collectors,” Gharegozlou said. “And it’s access to the whole Disney universe, under one roof.”

Dapper Labs gained prominence through the success of its NBA Top Shot collectible platform during the initial surge of the NFT market in 2021. Renowned for their Ethereum NFT project CryptoKitties, the company developed the Flow blockchain specifically to manage large-scale consumer applications, including platforms for collectibles and games.

Disney has previously ventured into the realm of digital consumer products. The Hollywood studio recently collaborated with Cryptoys to release a collection of limited-edition NFT Star Wars toys earlier in May.