Bored Ape Yacht Club Creators in Funding Talks With Andreessen Horowitz: Report
The startup is seeking a valuation of as much as $5 billion in the proposed funding round.
Feb 3, 2022 at 12:53 p.m. UTCUpdated May 11, 2023 at 7:16 p.m. UTC
:format(webp)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/coindesk/ZNUNWW5KJ5FQRGMIGRLUCA543E.png)
/arc-photo-coindesk/arc2-prod/public/LXF2COBSKBCNHNRE3WTK2BZ7GE.png)
Yuga Labs, the startup behind Bored Ape Yacht Club, is in talks with venture capital heavyweight Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) over a funding round that would give it a valuation as high as $5 billion, the Financial Times reported Thursday.
- Yuga Labs is in talks about selling a multimillion-dollar stake with a16z among the firms it is courting, the Financial Times said, citing people with knowledge of the discussions.
- Bored Ape Yacht Club, a collection of 10,000 algorithmically generated images of cartoon apes minted and sold as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) on the Ethereum blockchain, counts a score of celebrities as owners, including Paris Hilton and Steph Curry.
- Rapper Eminem recently bought one on OpenSea for 123.45 ETH ($319,000).
- Previously an early investor in Facebook, Twitter, Airbnb and Stripe, a16z has invested extensively in the cryptocurrency industry, recently telling investors it is looking to raise $3.5 billion for a new crypto venture fund.
12:55
a16z Crypto CTO on ZK Projects ‘Jolt’ and ‘Lasso,’ State of Crypto Tech Research
06:18
Eco App CEO on Launching 'Cash-Like' Crypto Wallet 'Beam'
03:46
Venture Capital Firm a16z Unloads $7M of MKR Tokens as Price Soars
06:16
A16z Chooses London as Destination for First Office Outside U.S.
:format(webp)/s3.amazonaws.com/arc-authors/coindesk/008ae87f-5c6e-412b-816b-ded600ac5054.png)
Jamie Crawley is a CoinDesk news reporter based in London.