Richard Muirhead, co-founder and managing partner of Fabric Ventures. Image: Fabric Ventures
The European Investment Fund has contributed to the new fund in a bid to ‘unlock financing opportunities’ for blockchain entrepreneurs.
Fabric Ventures, a Luxembourg-based VC firm, has announced a $130m fund for founders of blockchain and digital asset companies.
The new fund includes $30m from the European Investment Fund (EIF) as well as investment from VC firm Atomico, Mike Novogratz’s Galaxy Digital and Barry Silbert’s DCG.
Other backers include partners, executives, contributors and founders from Ethereum, Wise, PayU, Polkadot, PayPal and Google.
Fabric Ventures bills itself as a VC that backs the ‘open economy’, which includes companies that utilise technologies of the open web, such as digital assets and blockchain, that support the free flow of users, data and value.
“Fabric’s new fund will be put to work partnering with the most daring and relentless entrepreneurs of the open economy on their journey to architect lasting protocols and platforms, not simply companies,” said Richard Muirhead, co-founder and managing partner at Fabric Ventures.
“It is now well acknowledged that there is a need for a web that is user owned and, consequently, more human-centric. There are astonishing people crafting this digital fabric for the benefit of all. We are excited to support those people with our latest fund.”
From a 2017 fund, the company has a portfolio of open web, finance and media companies that have a combined valuation of $42bn.
Axie Infinity is an NFT-based game in Fabric’s portfolio that has recently been growing in popularity. It is a Pokémon-inspired universe where anyone can earn tokens through skilled gameplay and contributions to the ecosystem, allowing players to battle, collect, raise and build a kingdom for their pets.
Alain Godard, chief executive of the EIF, said that despite rich engineering talent, deep-tech entrepreneurs in the blockchain sector in Europe often struggle to find financial support and investors that have a deep understanding of their space.
“This partnership seeks to address that need and unlock financing opportunities for entrepreneurs active in the field of blockchain technologies – a field of particular strategic importance for the EU and our competitiveness on the global stage.”
