US-based blockchain technology provider ConsenSys secured $450m in series D funding yesterday from investors including internet and telecommunications group SoftBank’s Vision Fund 2, software provider Microsoft and talent agency United Talent Agency (UTA).
ParaFi Capital led the round and was also joined by Anthos Capital, Sound Ventures, Temasek, C Ventures, Marshall Wace, Third Point and True Capital Management while UTA took part through corporate venturing subsidiary UTA VC. It valued the company at $7bn.
Founded in 2014, ConsenSys provides developers with tools to launch applications on the Ethereum blockchain, covering areas including non-fungible token (NFT) marketplaces, decentralised finance applications and play-to-earn gaming.
The company plans to convert the series D proceeds to Ethereum as it looks to increase its balance of Ethereum on hand relative to its US dollar holdings. Funding will also be used to expand and redesign its crypto-wallet platform, MetaMask.
Digital entertainment and blockchain technology developer Animoca Brands, cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase and financial services firm HSBC took part in the company’s $200m series C round in November 2021, at a $3.2bn valuation.
ConsenSys had pulled in $65m through an April 2021 round backed by payment services provider Mastercard, trading firms Alameda Research and Capital Markets Trading (through its CMT Digital subsidiary) and investment banking firms JP Morgan and UBS.
ConsenSys’ founder and chief executive, Joseph Lubin, said the company plans to make its next round crypto-native, with investments made in Ethereum as a commitment to the paradigm shift to cryptocurrency.
Lubin said: “I think of ConsenSys as a broad and deep capabilities machine for the decentralised protocols ecosystem, able to rapidly capitalise at scale on fundamental new constructs that emerge, such as developer tooling, tokenisation, token launches, wallets, security audits, DeFi (1.0, 2.0 and beyond), NFTs, bridges, layer-2 scaling, [decentralised automonomous organisations] and more.”
