Ben Strack

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 <ul>
 <li>The fund is the largest joint commitment made toward any blockchain ecosystem, according to the company</li>
 <li>The Flow blockchain has more than 7,000 developers </li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



Dapper Labs, the Web3 platform powering blockchain-based trading card platform NBA Top Shot, unveiled a $725 million ecosystem fund in a bid to spur community growth.&nbsp;



The fund is the largest joint commitment made toward any blockchain ecosystem, the company said in a statement Tuesday. Participants include venture capital firm a16z, Coatue, CoinFund, Greenfield One, Liberty City Ventures, Digital Currency Group and Union Square Ventures.



&#8220;As [Web3] accelerates and sophisticated app developers search for the best platforms, Flow is perhaps the best decentralized blockchain built for the scale, security, and ease of use most modern startups need to succeed,&#8221; CoinFund Managing Partner David Pakman said in a statement.&nbsp;



The fund will offer existing and future developers support to build applications on Flow blockchain through investments and FLOW token grants. It will focus on support for gaming, infrastructure, decentralized finance, content and creators, and the capital may also be used for team expansion, user acquisition and general operating expenses.&nbsp;



A spokesperson for the company did not immediately return a request for comment.&nbsp;



Originally developed by Dapper Labs, Flow is a blockchain built for consumers that has had daily transactions triple since September 2021, according to the company.



Flow has more than 7,000 developers building on the blockchain. The protocol has roughly 1,000 active projects and 175,000 monthly active users. The Web3 platform powers <a href="https://nbatopshot.com/?c=BS_HP&amp;gclid=Cj0KCQjwmuiTBhDoARIsAPiv6L-FFjSIRpXDXLPG42G8C9B1eDZzbN5KHBcYDl_wgMVfAhiAYc7uxJgaAs_HEALw_wcB&amp;gclsrc=aw.ds" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">NBA Top Shot</a>, which allows users to own, sell and trade NFTs of NBA and WNBA plays and players, as well as <a href="https://nflallday.com/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">NFL All Day</a>, which offers licensed NFL video NFTs (non-fungible tokens).



FLOW has a market capitalization of roughly $1.5 billion, according to Blockworks data. The price was up 8.2% to trade at $3.999 in the last 24 hours as of midday Tuesday.&nbsp;



Dapper Labs <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/dapper-labs-closes-250m-round-bit2me-ico-raises-23-4m/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">closed a $250 million round</a> in September, which the company said would be used to support additional brand-driven sports-, entertainment- and music-based products. Coatue and a16z had invested then, as well.



The investment is the latest in a string of digital asset investments for a16z, which recently launched <a href="https://a16z.com/2022/04/21/announcing-a16z-crypto-research/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">a crypto research lab</a>. The firm was <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/what-does-binances-investment-in-twitter-mean-for-the-social-networks-future/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">one of 18 investors</a> backing Elon Musk’s $44 billion bid to purchase Twitter, pledging $400 million. It also <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/a16z-leads-25m-raise-for-nft-focused-cocreate-protocol/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">led a $25 million seed round</a> to fund the launch of the NFT-focused Co:Create protocol.



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