NEAR Protocol raises $21.6 million in token sale led by a16z

Almost two weeks after launching an early version of its mainnet, NEAR protocol announced the closing of a $21.6 million token sale led a16z, the crypto arm of venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz. CoinDesk reports about 40 other firms joined the round, including Libertus, Blockchange, Animal Ventures, and Notation Capital, as well as some existing NEAR investors like Pantera and Electric Capital. NEAR has now secured over $33 million to date as it previously raised a $12.1 million round last July.

Why it matters:

• NEAR will need a healthy amount of funds at its disposal to not only launch a production-ready Proof-of-Stake blockchain within the coming months but also to incentivize developers to build on the network. The breadth of developer tools and application ecosystem is a better measure of success for smart contract platforms. And without a differentiated offering (NEAR has a novel consensus mechanism but has drawn comparison’s to ETH 2.0’s design), developers will need a reason, often a financial one, to make a switch.
• This announcement comes just four days after a16z raised $515 million for its second crypto fund. While there was some thought that a16z would direct the new money towards projects building on proven layer-1 chains, the NEAR investment could be a sign that crypto funds are not done chasing after potential Ethereum competitors. NEAR joins AVA Labs, Celo, Dapper, Dfinity, and Oasis Labs as other smart contract platforms (or “world computer” types) supported by a16z.