Maple Finance Scoops Up Lending Protocol Avari to Hasten Launch on Solana

Institutional crypto credit infrastructure platform Maple Finance is acquiring a decentralized finance (DeFi) lending protocol in a bid to expedite the platform’s launch on the Solana blockchain.

Pending a close of its dealings, Maple is expected to scoop up Solana-based Avari, an uncollateralized lending protocol founded by a team of engineers at Stanford, for an undisclosed sum.

The move positions Maple to become the first corporate credit marketplace to launch on Solana, according to a statement on Thursday. Solana is a public blockchain utilizing proof-of-stake and proof-of-history mechanisms to secure consensus.

“If you look at the various blockchain ecosystems, Solana has uniquely captured the interest of the largest capital markets participants,” Maple’s head of Capital Markets Daniel Kim told Blockworks on Thursday.

“I find Solana to be a protocol for the next wave of financial institutions and traders and by building on Solana, Maple will be expanding offerings that meet the next generation of capital markets needs.”

As part of its acquisition, Avari will collapse into Maple along with three team members from Avari who will join Maple to focus solely on building a “light (V1) version of Maple on Solana,” Maple’s CEO Sidney Powell told Blockworks via email.

Powell also said Maple would be hiring multiple Rust developers to “keep up the pace.”

Maple’s acquihire of Avari and its team is expected to increase the lending platform’s total addressable market as well as grow its potential total value locked, according to Kim and Powell.

Maple is now set to expand to Solana in the first financial quarter of this year and said it will open the door to retail investors as well as new customers from the Solana ecosystem including decentralized autonomous organizations.

“This provides the potential to add billions of dollars in untapped value to the Maple ecosystem,” said Powell.

Maple Finance debuted back in May of last year and touts having facilitated over $540 million in loans across four pools so far, with one pool being dedicated to quantitative trading firm Alameda Research.

Avari’s CEO Quinn Barry said in the statement that working alongside Maple would allow his team to focus on their “core competency” — technical development — to “scale much faster.”

“This combination of our engineering team and Maple’s proven track record is the perfect opportunity to build the best-undercollateralized lending protocol in DeFi,” said Barry.

Maple said it plans to release new features to further scale its offerings, shorter-term loans, flexible loans and expansion into new verticals. The acquisition is set to close in Q1 2022 and will be paid for using a combination of cash and tokens, according to the statement.

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