NEAR Launching $100M VC Fund For Web3

The NEAR Foundation will be launching a $100 million venture capital fund to support web3 developments and entertainment. 

Venture Lab Initiative

The project includes a venture capital fund and a venture lab. The NEAR Foundation is partnering with Caerus Ventures, which will be one of the seed round investors of this fund. The VC fund alone has an initial closing of $50 million, with a target of raising $100 million in its seed series A round. The venture lab will function as a platform to support the work of creators, talent, and franchise owners towards generating the next generation of platforms. It will receive the first lot of the investments. 

According to Near Foundation CEO Marieke Flament, the choice to work with Caerus was due to the similarity of values. Flament said, 

“We are both trying to reinvent what it means to be a creator. They have a uniquely differentiated proposition and robust investment thesis predicated on the tokenisation of entertainment.”

Partnered With New Investment Firm

Caerus Ventures is a newly established Swiss-based investment firm that is hoping to catalye innovation in Web3 by supporting sport, music, film, fashion, and artistic ventures in that direction. The firm is led by IMG executive Nathan Pillai, who shared his thoughts on the project, saying, 

“I believe talent and intellectual property (IP) creators need to have a more equitable share of value that is created, and for this, to be then shared amongst consumers and fans. We want to focus on how to deepen engagement and reward the people who spend a lot of time and money consuming entertainment.” Pillai said, adding that the company is currently looking at investing in a music streaming service that allows users to invest in the success of an artist.”

Latest In NEAR

The NEAR Protocol has had a very eventful year. The ‘NEARCON’ event is being held in Lisbon in the coming week. Most recently, the NearPay app successfully launched its virtual crypto cards and wallet apps to further bridge the divide between fiat and crypto. 

However, throughout August, the protocol was on the verge of several attacks from malicious actors. At the beginning of the month, the team worked on a tip from security firm Hacxyk to resolve a bug in its wallet similar to that of Solana, where over 5000 wallets were compromised. A few weeks later, the NEAR rainbow bridge was targeted by a hacking attempt, which was fended off successfully by security protocols, keeping user funds quite safe. 

Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.