One of Silicon Valley’s most talked-about blockchain startups, OpenSea said on Tuesday that it has received $300 million in additional venture funding, making it the latest business to benefit from the frenzied rush to invest cryptocurrency start-ups.
Only four years after its founding, the start-value up’s has risen to a stunning $13.3 billion, thanks to a fresh round of financing spearheaded by the investment companies Paradigm and Coatue Management. According to information supplied by the business, OpenSea had already received more than $100 million from a diverse group of investors, including the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and actor Ashton Kutcher.
OpenSea was established in 2017 as a marketplace for the purchase and sale of so-called nonfungible tokens (also known as nonfungible coins), which are one-of-a-kind bits of digital code supported by blockchain technology.
There is a wide range of NFT objects available, but the most popular are works of digital art made by artists who offer their pieces for sale on the OpenSea website, which is analogous to selling on eBay. Winning bids on Ethereum, a major cryptocurrency and blockchain technology that is tied to most types of NFTs, may occasionally reach hundreds of thousands of dollars in value.
As cryptocurrency-focused start-ups have gained in popularity in recent months, OpenSea has emerged as the go-to location for fans looking to exchange non-fungible tokens (NFTs). This has piqued the interest of investors who are eager to put increasingly huge bets on the crowded cryptocurrency market as a result of this.
According to statistics gathered by PitchBook, a company that analyses private investments, more than $3 billion in private investment will go into non-traditional technology businesses in 2021. According to PitchBook, investors put more than $28 billion into cryptocurrencies and non-financial technology (NFT) start-ups throughout the globe last year.
Many cryptocurrency opponents, however, believe that the current craze around NFTs and blockchain technology is a fad that is plagued by dubious conduct. Earlier this week, there was a short rift between OpenSea and one of its clients, who alleged that NFTs valued at $2.2 million had been taken from him.
Technologists have not been deterred by these concerns. Thousands of workers from major technology firms like as Meta, Google, and Amazon are flocking to cryptocurrency and non-financial technology (NFT) start-ups. They are attracted by the prospect of working on innovative — and possibly profitable — technologies. Brian Roberts, the previous chief financial officer of Lyft, departed the ride-hailing firm to become the company’s first chief financial officer, which he did in January of this year. Also recently appointed as vice president of product is Shiva Rajaraman, a former vice president of commerce for Meta, who previously served as vice president of product at Meta.
The firm said that it intends to utilise the extra capital to hire more personnel to complement its existing workforce of more than 90 people, while also tripling the size of its trust and safety team. It also wants to spend extensively in product development to make its blockchain technology more accessible to mainstream users. Additionally, the business will soon start a grant programme to assist innovators and blockchain builders in the non-financial technology (NFT) sector.
