The NEAR Protocol, a proof-of-stake blockchain, has acquired $150 million in early funding to help Web3 technologies gain traction. The investment will be used to establish regional centres and create awareness about blockchain and decentralised technology, according to the team.
The money will help NEAR Protocol to promote Web3 adoption. Projects built on the NEAR blockchain will be able to reach new audiences.
Mechanism Capital, Dragonfly Capital, a16z, Jump, Alameda, Zee Prime, Folius, Amber Group, 6th Man Ventures, and Circle Ventures all participated in the financing round, headed by hedge fund Three-Arrows Capital. The seed round was also attended by MetaWeb.vc, the NEAR ecosystem fund. Aave Founder Stani Kulechov and angel investors Alan Howard and Santiago Santos also contributed to the money.
Three-Arrows Capital’s co-founder and chairman, Kyle Davies, said, “We are eager to help the NEAR team and ecosystem as they grow blockchain applications.”
Amos Zhang, the founder of MetaWeb.vc, supported NEAR Protocol, stating that its technologies are ideal and best suited for blockchain adoption.
While acknowledging that the DeFi sector is still in its early stages, the NEAR protocol put down $800 million in 2021 for new projects of DeFi.
Ardana, a Cardano-based stablecoin center, also joined up NEAR late last year. The partnership seeks to build a bridge architecture that would allow users to move funds from the NEAR protocol to Cardano, another proof-of-stake blockchain. The Ardana platform will use NEAR (NEAR) tokens as collateral to issue stablecoins.
