OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, raised $300 million in a Series C fundraising round led by Paradigm and Coatue, valuing the company at $13.3 billion.
Opensea Raises $300 million in a Series C fundraising round
OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, revealed on Tuesday that it has raised $300 million in a Series C fundraising round, valuing the company at $13.3 billion. Venture finance firms Paradigm and Coatue led the round.
Former Andreessen Horowitz general partner Katie Haun’s new fund, KRH, confirmed to Decrypt that it invested in the round; a16z participated in both the Series A and Series B, and Haun sits on the board of OpenSea.
The money will be used to scale up product development and hire more staff, as well as improve customer support and help grow the larger NFT and Web3 markets, according to the NFT marketplace co-founder and CEO, Devin Finzer, in a blog post announcing the funding.
“We want to be the place where these new open digital economies may thrive,” says the company “In an emailed statement, Finzer stated.
Announcing Series C! We’re building the friendliest & most trusted NFT marketplace with the best selection across many chains. The funding helps us accelerate product development, improve trust & safety, and invest deeply in the web3 community & ecosystem. https://t.co/OmRPleMCOX
— OpenSea (@opensea) January 5, 2022“We’ll begin this year by decreasing the entrance barriers to the NFT space on OpenSea and investing in the ecosystem and community that supports it.”
The largest NFT marketplace
OpenSea was valued at $1.5 billion as recently as July 2020, following a $100 million Series B financing. The Information stated in November that its Series C would be valued at $10 billion.
The $13.3 billion figure released by the NFT marketplace today highlights the growing popularity of NFTs, which are blockchain-based documents of ownership for digital assets.
Bored Ape Yacht Club and CryptoPunks, for example, have hosted some of the most popular Ethereum-based NFT collections in the area on the NFT marketplace.
OpenSea’s monthly volume has continued to impress, as Decrypt highlighted just this week, months after many branded non-fungible tokens a fad when the initial fervor died down.
The NFT market exploded in August, and the NFT marketplace had its second-largest month ever in December, with $3 billion worth of Ethereum NFTs changing hands.
So far in the new year, it hasn’t slowed down. With $243 million in Ethereum NFT volume on January 2, it experienced its third-best trading day ever.
Polygon NFT trade volume is also increasing, having increased for three months straight to $76.1 million in December.
OpenSea’s New Vice President of Product and CFO
As part of the financing announcement, Finzer stated that OpenSea has hired Shiva Rajaraman, a former Facebook employee, as its new Vice President of Product.
Nate Chastain, OpenSea’s previous head of product, left the company after it was uncovered that he utilized inside information to buy NFTs before they were available on the market and then sold them for a profit.
Rajamaran’s responsibilities will include assisting the company in supporting NFTs from other blockchains (the Solana NFT community is growing) and connecting users with tools for finding digital art and managing their collections.
OpenSea hired Brian Roberts, a former Lyft CFO, as its new CFO last month, prompting a backlash from crypto enthusiasts when he hinted at a traditional IPO.
The OpenSea founders “have shown great tenacity over the last four years, enduring uncertainty and sticking to their vision of NFTs as an internet- and world-changing primitive,” according to Paradigm co-founder Fred Ehrsam.
In 2021, NFTs have unquestionably made a stir and have entered the mainstream cultural debate. We’ll see if one site that sells them is worth $13 billion or more in the coming years.
