Huobi Group, one of the world’s leading crypto companies, announced the launch of Huobi Ventures today. The wholly-owned subsidiary will have a fighting fund of $100 million which will be focused on growing Huobi’s venture investment portfolio and supporting different blockchain projects via long-term investment strategies.
The new venture arm by the cryptocurrency exchange operator will place $100 million into early-stage blockchain and DeFi projects over the next three years. The fund is also expected to be used to make strategic acquisitions to diversify and expand Huobi’s portfolio and establish a dedicated $10 million non-fungible token (NFT) fund.
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Huobi Ventures consolidates a number of existing investment vehicles including Huobi Eco Fund, Huobi Capital and Huobi DeFi Labs. The new single entity is now expected to drive Huobi’s investment strategy.
The new Huobi Ventures is the latest move by Huobi to diversify its operations away from trading. It follows the recent launch of Huobi Tech (1611.HK), a separate crypto-related fund for institutional investors.
Huobi Group CFO Lily Zhang said in a press release: “While we’ve made significant progress in our investments already, the formation of Huobi Ventures is a more concerted effort to accelerate our growth at a pivotal point for Huobi.”
“We have had separate teams focus on different investment strategies, but by bringing everyone together under a single entity, we can create a more cohesive strategy and continue to invest in and support the most innovative projects that are shaping the blockchain and DeFi spaces.”
NFT Investment
From the $100 million, $10 million is being used specifically for investing in NFTs and NFT trading marketplaces.
Zhang said of the NFT explosion: “NFTs are the future of art and collectibles, but they’re also giving creators like musicians and artists a new way to engage with fans and introducing blockchain to the mainstream audience. While NFTs have already become a growing part of the internet culture, what we’ll see in the market today is only a fraction of what’s actually possible with NFTs. As an immutable way to prove authenticity and ownership of digital files, we’ll see a use case increased usage across gaming, media, enterprise and more in the near future.”
