Multinational sports footwear and equipment company Nike and virtual fashion company RTFKT Studios, which joined the Nike family in late 2021, have launched the popular brand's first virtual sneakers as NFTs.
After several months of waiting, Nike has revealed its first virtual sneakers. It has done so together with the virtual fashion company RTFKT Studios, which became part of the multinational sports equipment company in December last year, following an acquisition made to accelerate the digital transformation of the sports brand.
Nike's NFT sneakers are about wearables that were contained in the mysterious NFTs that RTFKT launched in February of this year, called MNLTHThese consist of 20.000 virtual metal boxes with geometric patterns and the Nike and RTFKT logos engraved on the sides.
To reveal the contents of these mysterious boxes, their owners have been participating in different missions assigned by the company since their launch. Now that the mysterious boxes have been opened, Nike's NFT sneakers have come to light, surprising their fans, who are already starting to show them off on social media.
RTFKT also released a second series of 20.000 gold-colored mystery boxes, called MNLTH 2, which could open later this year to reveal new surprises to Nike users.
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Nike CryptoKick Sneakers
Nike’s virtual sneaker collection, dubbed “RTFKT x Nike Dunk Genesis CryptoKicks,” consists of a series of 20.000 NFTs — one per mystery box — that feature a white, Dunk-style sneaker that can be customized via “Skin Vials,” according to RTFKT.
On apps like Snapchat, several users have shown showing off these sneakers as wearables.
On Twitter, the sports equipment company said it was excited for what was to come after the successful launch of its first NFTs. RTFKT called Nike’s first virtual sneakers “the future of sneakers.”
Nike CryptoKicks is the sneaker imagined for the year 2052, according to the virtual fashion company. “Made of flexible screens, soles and accessories for galactic exploration, enhanced with the revolutionary Skin Vial technology,” the company commented on the social network.
Nike NFT sneakers are selling for 3 ethers
Owners of the MNLTH NFT boxes, who received Nike CryptoKick sneakers, are trading these NFTs on the Opensea platform, the largest non-fungible token marketplace in the crypto industry.
At the time of writing, the minimum price at which NFT sneakers from Nike's collection are being offered is 3 ethers, currently around $8.550.
Source: opensea
Nike: Technology, innovation and creativity
Nike has been exploring use cases for new technologies to accelerate its growth and transformation for some time. In December 2021, when it announced the purchase of RTFKT Studios, Nike President and CEO John Donahoe said: he pointed The goal behind the acquisition was to boost the digital footprint of its sports brand. Donahoe said RTFKT would expand Nike’s “digital footprint and capabilities.”
For its part, RTFKT Studios, founded in 2020, has become one of the most important companies in the digital industry. To date, it has collaborated with major brands and artists such as Fewocious, Atari and Epic Games, among others.
In early February, Nike sued an NFT merchant called StockX for selling collections of its branded NFT sneakers without authorization.
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