Solana Ventures has revealed the launch of a $100 million fund dedicated to Web3 startups in South Korea. According to Solana Labs’ general manager Johnny Lee, the capital will be dedicated to non-fungible tokens (NFTs), decentralized finance (defi), and game finance (gamefi) development.
Solana Ventures Reveals $100 Million Web3 Fund Dedicated to Finding Talent and Innovative Startups in South Korea
Proponents behind the smart contract protocol Solana plan to expand into South Korea by offering a Web3 fund worth $100 million to startups and developers creating Web3 projects.
Solana Labs’ general manager Johnny Lee told Techcrunch reporter Jacquelyn Melinek that the fund will focus on Web3 applications that revolve around NFTs, defi, blockchain gaming concepts, and gamefi.
Austin Federa, the head of communications at Solana Labs, explained to Melinek that the fund stems from the Solana community treasury and Solana Ventures’ pool of capital.
Solana Ventures has dedicated millions of dollars toward Web3 projects and startups.
Solana Ventures, the investment arm of Solana Labs, explained that gaming and non-fungible tokens are popular in South Korea. Lee detailed that a lion’s share of NFT and gaming activities on the Solana network derive from the East Asian country.
“A big portion of Korea’s gaming industry is moving into web3,” Lee detailed on Wednesday. “We want to be flexible; there’s a wide range of project sizes, team sizes, so some of [our investments] will be venture-sized checks,” the Solana Labs general manager remarked.
Solana’s native token solana (SOL) is in the top ten crypto market positions in ninth place in terms of capitalization. SOL’s $13.22 billion market capitalization represents 1.03% of the crypto economy’s $1.290 trillion market valuation.
SOL, however, is down 39.2% over the last month and 19.6% of the fall was during the past two weeks. In terms of total value locked (TVL) in defi, Solana is ranked fifth with $3.76 billion. Solana’s TVL in defi has lost 33.96% in the past month, according to defillama.com statistics.
Additionally, Solana suffered another network outage as the network halted block production on June 1. In December 2021, Solana Ventures, in a partnership with Griffin Gaming and Forte, launched a $150 million fund for Web3 products.
Amid the announcement concerning Solana Ventures’ latest fund focused on South Korea and Web3 development, Lee said he expects Solana to showcase “high-quality and fun games” during the last two quarters of 2022.