Injective launches DeFi ecosystem fund

Injective, a layer-1 blockchain for decentralized finance applications, announced Wednesday that it is launching a $150 million ecosystem fund.

Why it matters: Despite the collapse of some major players in the crypto ecosystem, investors remain bullish on the technology’s potential for transforming financial applications.

Details: The ecosystem fund aims to support web3 projects building exchanges, options, derivatives or lending applications on the Injective or Cosmos blockchains.

• Potential sectors it will invest in include interoperability, decentralized finance, trading, proof-of-stake infrastructure, rollups and scalability solutions.
• Consortium members include Pantera Capital, Kucoin Ventures, Jump Crypto, IDG Capital, Gate Labs, Delphi Labs, Flow Traders and Kraken Ventures.
• Projects interested in investment can submit an application for consideration or participate in a virtual hackathon the consortium plans to host in March.

Between the lines: “Given recent happenings in the crypto ecosystem, a lot of new projects don’t really know which VCs are active and supporting the space,” Injective Labs founder and CEO Eric Chen says.

• “We decided to form this consortium as a signal that these partners are heavily investing in the Injective ecosystem,” he added.

Of note: Last August, Injective Labs raised $40 million in a funding round that Jump Crypto led and which included participation from Brevan Howard Digital.