US-based blockchain software provider ConsenSys secured $65m on Tuesday in a funding round featuring a number of blockchain-focused companies and financial services firms.
The round included Protocol Labs, the developer of cloud storage project Filecoin Network; Maker Foundation, an organisation affiliated with the Dai stablecoin; blockchain-focused quantitative trading firm Alameda Research; and trading firm CMT Group’s digital asset trading and investment arm, CMT Digital.
Payment services provider Mastercard and financial services firms JP Morgan and UBS also took part, as did Greater Bay Area Homeland Development Fund, Fenbushi Capital, Quotidian Ventures, The LAO and Liberty City Ventures. Several investment funds backed the round through Ethereum-based stablecoins Dai and USD Coin.
Founded in 2014, Consensys has built a suite of software products used by developers to facilitate the launch of financial infrastructure on the Ethereum blockchain. It had previously raised $8.6m of funding from telecommunications firm SK Telecom in mid-2019.
The company launched a strategic investment arm called Consensys Ventures in 2017 to back projects based on Ethereum. It later spun off its investment and portfolio management unit as an independent firm called ConsenSys Mesh in early 2020.
ConsenSys founder Joseph Lubin, also a co-founder of Ethreum, said: “ConsenSys’ software stack represents access to a new automated objective trust foundation enabled by decentralised protocols like Ethereum.
“We are proud to partner with preeminent financial firms alongside leading crypto companies to further converge the centralised and decentralised financial domains at this particularly exciting time of growth for ConsenSys and the entire industry.”