A new funding round for MetaMask owner ConsenSys could help the company with plans for a DAO and a token. Here’s the latest.
What Happened: ConsenSys raised $450 million in a Series D round Tuesday that values the company at $7 billion.
ParaFi led the raise with returning investors in the round that include Third Point, True Capital Management, United Talent Agency’s venture fund UTA VC
New investors in the company include Temasek, Softbank Vision Fund 2, Anthos Capital, C Ventures, Sound Ventures and Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ: NASDAQ:MSFT).
Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) Global Inc (NASDAQ: COIN), who could be considered a rival of MetaMask was not listed as a participant in the funding round. Coinbase was an investor in the company’s last funding round in November at a $3 billion valuation.
ConsenSys’ revenue for 2021 was not disclosed, but was in the “nine figures” range according to the company.
MetaMask has over 30 million monthly active users, up 42% from a period four months ago, and comes as the crypto wallet is one of the major forces in the non-fungible tokens market.
Infura, another ConsenSys product, is used by 430,000 developers, up from a reported 350,000 in November 2021.
Related Link: What Is MetaMask?
Why It’s Important: The new funding round comes as former shareholders of ConsenSys recently filed a lawsuit against Joseph Lubin, the founder of the company. The lawsuit stems over the splitting of the company into two pieces and undervaluing the assets, including a sale that JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: NYSE:JPM) was involved in.
JPMorgan is said to hold a 10% stake in ConsenSys as part of its involvement in previous transactions.
Funding will be used to help grow the company’s employees and grow its product offerings. Included in upcoming products could be a plug-in system to help integrate with other protocols outside of Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) including Solana (CRYPTO: SOL).
“There’s a great user interface that we’re going to launch pretty soon,” Lubin told Decrypt.
MetaMask is planning to launch a DAO (decentralized autonomous organization) in the future.
“There is a DAO that is being formed right now in the context of MetaMask. It won’t govern MetaMask, but it will enable the creation of novel new pieces of MetaMask to be funded,” he added.
Lubin confirmed that MetaMask is planning to launch a token, something that has been rumored by the cryptocurrency and NFT communities for some time. Several cryptocurrency and NFT projects have rewarded early backers or members with a token airdrop.
MetaMask Head of Operations Jacobc.eth said the company planned to launch a token that would not be a cash grab, while speaking at Ethereum Denver last month.
Photo: Courtesy Ivan Radic on Flickr
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