W3BCloud, a joint venture between AMD and ConsenSys, has raised $20.5m to create a network of blockchain data centres and establish a new base in Dublin.
Today (25 June), W3BCloud announced that it has raised $20.5m to roll out a network of data centres dedicated to the blockchain economy. It also announced plans to hire 20 employees at a new base in Dublin over the next year, working across areas such as finance and R&D.
The business, which is a joint venture between AMD and ConsenSys, closed $20.5m in convertible notes from the two companies, along with several family offices in the United Arab Emirates.
It will use the funding to roll out and operate its first Ethereum blockchain data centres. The company plans to expand its network of decentralised data centres around the world as more funding is raised.
W3BCloud’s co-founder and chief investment officer, Wael Aburida, will be based in Ireland as the company builds out its team. Its headquarters will be located in the Dublin office of blockchain software company ConsenSys, according to the Irish Times.
Data centres
In a statement, W3BCloud claimed that Ethereum is emerging as the programmable blockchain of choice for decentralised finance and US dollar-pegged stablecoins. It said that the economic disruption of 2020 coupled with the global dollar shortage has sparked an increase in dollar-backed stablecoin transactions on the Ethereum blockchain.
W3BCloud’s co-founder and CEO, Sami Issa, said: “The trustless, permissionless and decentralised economy requires robust and dedicated data centres to scale. W3BCloud brings together the pre-eminent GPU manufacturer and the leading blockchain developer to build the compute infrastructure for the blockchain economy.”
ConsenSys founder Joseph Lubin, who also co-created Ethereum, said that W3BCloud is building “the next generation of decentralised compute, storage and bandwidth for the planet”.
Jörg Roskowetz, the head of AMD’s blockchain business unit, added: “Parallel and distributed computing focused on blockchain use cases is a fast-growing segment of the industry. I am very excited to see W3BCloud power up their first GPU-centric data centre focused on blockchain as they work to ramp aggressively across multiple geographies throughout 2020.”
