Quick take:
- Former TON Foundation members Ian Wittkopp and Inal Kardan have launched TON Ventures with an inaugural $40 million fund.
- The new for-profit venture firm may extend the first fund if more partners join in.
- Wittkopp said the fund targets opportunities in decentralised finance, gaming, ad/marketing and regulated financial products.
Former TON Foundation members Ian Wittkopp and Inal Kardan have launched TON Ventures, a new for-profit venture firm that invests in startups building on Open Network or TON Blockchain.
Ian Wittkopp and Inal Kardan secured $40 million for the inaugural fund. The co-founders did not share details of those who invested in the fund, saying the fund is mainly backed by individual private investors. According to the announcement, TON Ventures may extend the amount if more partners join in.
“The fundraise was very informal over a period where it began to make sense to make the move and go independent, but the full amount was raised around a month ago,” Wittkopp told The Block.
Why it matters
Before launching TON Ventures, Wittkop was the director of TON Accelerator at TON Foundation while Kardan was the gaming lead. Wittkopp was COO and head of investment at Ryze Labs, formerly known as Sino Global Capital.
The new venture firm is being launched at a time when the TON ecosystem is experiencing meteoric growth, with TON blockchain processing over 5.4 million transactions per day with more than 630,000 daily active wallets, according to TON Stat.
Wikktopp believes that the integration of the TON blockchain and Telegram could see “billion-dollar” companies built across decentralised finance (DeFi), blockchain gaming, ad/marketing and regulated financial products.
“We will invest across the app level in those verticals as well as tooling that makes the development and monetization process for TON ecosystem apps more seamless and higher quality,” he said.
Wittkopp said TON Ventures has already backed over a dozen projects including Catizen, Tradoor and Evaa Protocol, averaging a check size of $500,000, or below for the projects still in their early stages of development.
The fund plans to expand its portfolio, backing projects in the later stages including big protocols joining the TON ecosystem.
The BIG picture
The integration of the TON ecosystem with Telegram has tapped into one of the biggest crypto communities in social media, given the social media platform’s 900 million user base.
Telegram is now not only a place where crypto conversations take place but also home to web3 games like Notcoin and Hamster Kombat, which are built on TON blockchain. Pixelverse is the latest to reveal plans to join the TON ecosystem. In June, the company raised $5.5 million to expand its tap-to-earn game on Telegram.
Telegram is clearly a strategic advantage for the growth of the TON ecosystem. Since the two companies co-launched the TON Space wallet on the platform, TON has gone on to integrate Tether’s USDT, enabling users to send digital dollars via Telegram.
The integration has also attracted venture capital firms, with the likes of Pantera Capital, Kingsway Capital, Ryze Labs and Animoca Brands among those that have invested in the TON token.
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