Indian crypto platform CoinDCX has announced the launch of CoinDCX Ventures, a venture investment arm that will fund early-stage crypto and blockchain startups with a focus on the Web 3 ecosystem in India and globally. Through its new initiative, CoinDCX plans to invest Rs. 100 crore in startups across the world over the next 12 months. The announcement comes hot on the heels of CoinDCX closing a successful Series D funding round towards the end of April, raising over $135 million (roughly Rs. 1,000 crore).
The new venture capital arm of CoinDCX has already invested in seven Web 3 startups, a number that the CoinDCX’s CEO and co-founder, Sumit Gupta believes should hit more than 40 over a span of a year. Initiatives that CoinDCX Ventures has already invested in include a wallet solution in Liminal, a Web 3 gaming engine in MetaEngine, a cross-chain bridge protocol in Router, a Web 3 notification protocol in EPNS, a Web 3 social engine in Taki, as well as a distributed storage and computing protocol in Spheron.
CoinDCX has also appointed Rohit Jain as senior vice president and head of ventures and investments to lead CoinDCX Ventures. Having contributed to organisations like Myntra, and McKinsey, in addition to founding startups in the SaaS, media, and B2B e-commerce sectors, Jain will be spearheading the VC arm, working closely with fellow managing partners and CoinDCX co-founders Sumit Gupta and Neeraj Khandelwal.
Commenting on his appointment and the launch of CoinDCX Ventures, Jain said, “As a leader in India’s crypto ecosystem, CoinDCX Ventures is an essential next step underpinning CoinDCX’s mission to grow India’s Web 3 capabilities. CoinDCX Ventures will be crucial in supporting our vision of building India’s Web 3 ecosystem and further the march of emerging technologies in the nation and beyond. I’m thrilled to lead CoinDCX Ventures, bringing my wealth of knowledge across various industries and verticals to further CoinDCX’s mandate to cultivate a stronger crypto landscape.”
Founded in 2018, CoinDCX is the first Indian unicorn (valued over a billion dollars) in the cryptocurrency space. Apart from its recently closed $135 million (roughly Rs. 1044 crore) Series D funding round led by Pantera and Steadview, the company has previously raised over $100 million (roughly Rs. 760 crore) with Coinbase Ventures and Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin-led B Capital as its investors.
The company claims to have over 12.5 million users on its platform and competes with other cryptocurrency exchanges like CoinSwitch Kuber, which also became a unicorn last year, and WazirX.
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