Morgan Chittum

<div id="highlights-block_622f6a34c8037" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>The capital will go toward staff expansion, product development and future partnerships</li>
 <li>Other investors include Sequoia Capital, Electric Capital, Greylock Partners, Kindred Capital, Variant Fund and Solana Ventures</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



Magic Eden, a Solana-based NFT marketplace, announced a $27 million Series A funding round on Monday. The round was led by Paradigm with participation from Sequoia Capital, Electric Capital, Greylock Partners, Kindred Capital, Variant Fund and Solana Ventures.



The raise will go toward staff expansion, future partnerships and product development.



Jack Lu, CEO and co-founder of Magic Eden, told Blockworks that the funding will “help [them] expand as a company, including hiring the best talent, improving [their] product and infrastructure and investing in community initiatives.”



Among those initiatives is MagicDAO, a recent attempt to launch a decentralized autonomous organization (<a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/the-investors-guide-to-daos/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">DAO</a>) gated by the startup’s NFT (non-fungible token) collection Magic Ticket. The project airdropped 30,602 such tickets, which provide access to the group&#8217;s Discord channels, to community members and plans to involve those members in governance decisions in the future.



Magic Eden has recorded over $736 million in total trading volume since its launch last year — establishing itself as the largest Solana marketplace, according to data dashboard <a href="https://dappradar.com/nft/marketplaces/protocol/solana" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">DappRadar</a>.



Trading volumes for Magic Eden, however, have declined 85.76% to roughly $41 million in the past month — mirroring the performance of the broader NFT market.



The NFT marketplace OpenSea&#8217;s trading and transaction volumes fell as well, declining <a href="https://dappradar.com/nft" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">22.4%</a> and <a href="https://dappradar.com/nft" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">11.61%</a> respectively over the past month. OpenSea, unlike Magic Eden, auctions off NFTs on Ethereum and Polygon.



Paradigm, which launched <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/paradigm-launches-2-5-billion-crypto-fund/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">a $2.5 billion crypto fund</a> last November, is an investor in OpenSea as well.Benjamin Cohen, managing partner of crypto fund Web 3 Equities, previously <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/crypto-portfolio-managers-collectors-say-nft-market-bound-for-correction/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">told</a> Blockworks when a market is as fast as OpenSea, it is “fair to assume that [it] will experience large swings and corrections.”



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NFT Marketplace Magic Eden Secures $27M Series A

<div id="highlights-block_621eabc4c01c6" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>Led by Archetype, raise investors include Coinbase Ventures, Dragonfly Capital, Solana Ventures and ParaFi</li>
 <li>Parcl has 15 full-time employees but hopes to expand its staff to 25 by the end of the year</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



Parcl, a startup that digitizes real estate investments via the Solana blockchain, raised a $4.1 million seed round Tuesday, earmarked for marketing and staffing.



The New York-based company has 15 full-time employees but aims to expand its staff to 25 by year-end, co-founder and CEO Trevor Bacon told Blockworks.



“It&#8217;s a tough hiring environment, but we&#8217;ve managed with our team and vision to have been able to attract some of the best talent,” Bacon said.



Parcl’s mission is to give everyone a chance to invest in real estate, a market which has historically high barriers to entry, but consistent returns.



Parcl’s protocol allows users to invest in a digital square foot of real-live property via its price index, which replicates the price per square foot in various neighborhoods. The platform has transaction fees, but no minimum investment requirement.



“[For example], Tribeca will have a price per square foot of like $2,000, and we&#8217;ll call that a ‘parcl,’” he added. “‘A parcl’ is one square foot of any given neighborhood, and the blockchain is what allows you to create those assets and trade them. It’s basically a way to gain exposure to real estate.”



Led by Archetype, raise investors include Coinbase Ventures, Dragonfly Capital, Solana Ventures, ParaFi, Shima Capital, Slow Ventures, Tribe Capital, Not Boring Capital and FJ Labs.



Parcl will launch a testnet, along with the release and sale of a non-fungible token (NFT) collection in the coming weeks. All of the proceeds, Bacon said, will go toward buying someone a house.



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Blockchain Real Estate Startup Raises Round To Expand Digitized Property Investments

Jacquelyn Melinek

<div id="highlights-block_6216a7ee49b33" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>Dubbed Zebec Pay, the product is a tax-compliant, on-chain payroll processor that pays employees via USDC or other stablecoins within seconds</li>
 <li>Within a few months of launching, the protocol has over 250 projects built on the blockchain</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



A Solana crypto payment processor closed a $15 million venture round as demand for the proof-of-stake protocol lingers after its explosive growth last year.



Zebec’s Series A round was led by Distributed Global and Solana Ventures. The company did not disclose its latest valuation.



Other investors include Alameda Research, Circle, Coinbase, GoldenTree Asset Management and Lightspeed Venture Partners.



The platform enables continuous, real-time settlements and can be used to send and receive money for investments, payments and subscriptions. Dubbed Zebec Pay, the product is a tax-compliant, on-chain payroll processor that pays employees via USDC or other stablecoins within seconds.&nbsp;



Support for USDC “onboards a new generation of workers to the digital asset economy,” Circle Chief Financial Officer Jeremy Fox-Green told Blockworks.



&#8220;For crypto-curious employees, providing an option to allocate a portion of their paycheck into crypto is an easy way for them to get started, without having to transfer funds from a traditional banking system,&#8221; Fox-Green said.



<a href="https://zebec.io" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Zebec</a> launched in November 2021 and has raised $21 million in all and plans to raise additional funding “soon,” Founder Sam Thapaliya told Blockworks. “Our goal is growth and to grow fast.”



The protocol now supports more than 250 projects. Zebec additionally plans to launch a debit card that supports fiat-to-crypto conversion — a major force, in Thapaliya’s eyes, when it comes to driving mainstream crypto adoption.



The protocol is focused on scaling partnerships with products focused on a range of crypto products, including fractionalized non-fungible tokens (NFTs), yields and options, he said.&nbsp;



“People are doubling down on this idea of continuous money, and this is just the starting point,” Thapaliya said.



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Solana Payment Processor Raises $15M on Promise of Instant Settlements

<div id="highlights-block_61b8cb8c01cee" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>Forte is a platform where game developers, players and communities can integrate blockchain technologies into their games</li>
 <li>Griffin Gaming Partners is a venture capital firm that has invested over $400 million in 26 companies, including Forte and the instant messaging platform Discord</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



Solana Ventures launched a $150 million Web3 gaming fund initiative in a partnership with the gaming-focused blockchain platform, Forte and Griffin Gaming Partners, the companies shared Tuesday.



Solana Ventures is the strategic investment arm of Solana Labs, which is home to a blockchain ecosystem of over 400 projects across crypto areas including <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/the-investors-guide-to-defi/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">DeFi</a>, <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/the-investors-guide-to-nfts/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">NFTs</a> and Web3.&nbsp;



This initiative is Solana’s second gaming-focused investment. At the beginning of November, Solana also joined forces with FTX and Lightspeed Venture Partners to create a $100 million Web3 gaming investment initiative, Blockworks previously <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/ftx-solana-ventures-and-lightspeed-create-100m-web3-gaming-investment/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>.&nbsp;



Solana did not respond to requests for additional comment by Blockworks on the new initiative.



Forte is a platform where game developers, players and communities can integrate blockchain technologies like minting and selling non-fungible tokens, payment rails and other services for blockchain token economies into their games.&nbsp;



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">“Blockchain is enabling publishers to engage with their player bases in innovative ways,” Forte Co-founder and CEO Josh Williams said in a statement. “Where game developers once had to continuously create new content for players to consume as one-time purchases, with the advent of NFTs and other blockchain technologies, game developers can now offer their audiences real property rights and create self-sustaining and thriving economies within their games.”</blockquote>



Forte’s platform currently works with over 40 game developers and has raised more than $900 million from a handful of investors including Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Animoca Brands, Warner Music Group, Cosmos, Polygon Studios and Tiger Global. Last month, it closed its Series B which added $725 million of capital from Sea Capital and Kora Management, Blockworks <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/forte-adds-725-million-in-funding-to-push-blockchain-gaming-forward/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>.&nbsp;



Separately, Griffin Gaming Partners is a venture capital firm that has invested over $400 million in <a href="https://griffingp.com/ggp-portfolio/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">26 companies</a>, including Forte and the instant messaging platform Discord.&nbsp;



“Griffin is excited to continue to partner closely with Forte and Solana to help move the blockchain gaming ecosystem forward with a focus on the right technology, quality game-play, and long-term value,” Nick Tuosto, co-founder of Griffin Gaming Partners, said in the release.



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Solana Ventures Funds $150M Web3 Initiative With Forte, Griffin Gaming

<div id="highlights-block_618539c807fa8" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>The first investment has already been deployed to Faraway Games, a Web3 gaming studio focused on “social games with player-driven and decentralized economies”</li>
 <li>Play-to-earn games like Axie Infinity have been able to provide players with rewards that were up to several times their monthly salaries, creating a “blockchain-based” living wage, the Solana representative said </li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



FTX, Lightspeed Venture Partners and <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/sol-flips-usdt-in-market-cap-axie-infinity-ronin-dex-goes-live-markets-wrap/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Solana</a> Ventures have joined forces to create a $100 million Web3 gaming investment initiative, the companies said on Friday.&nbsp;



The investment will focus on gaming studios, technology and projects that focus on the overlap between blockchains and <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/coinfund-partner-thinks-nfts-are-the-future-of-gaming/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">gaming</a>.&nbsp;



Lightspeed has invested over $300 million in a range of early to late-stage gaming and crypto companies, including Epic Games, 1047 Games, TripleDot Studios, Faraway Games, FTX, Offchain Labs, Alchemy, Wintermute and others.



The initiative will help advance and develop new decentralized models for gaming as well as the tools developers need to build, according to a spokesperson for Solana Ventures. The first investment has already been deployed to Faraway Games, a Web3 gaming studio focused on “social games with player-driven and decentralized economies,” the release stated.&nbsp;



“In many ways, it could be argued that blockchain’s application to gaming is a no-brainer because gamers are already accustomed to tokenization and purchasing in-game items,” the spokesperson noted.&nbsp;



Some of the earliest games that exist have featured elements of virtual currency and brought in significant revenue for game studios and app stores, the spokesperson said. But as gaming evolved, in-game tokens and items have brought physical monetary value from the digital world, they added.&nbsp;



The Solana blockchain has over 2.2 million non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and over 125 NFT collections, with over a dozen of blockchain-based games. “In the last few months, we&#8217;ve seen talented game builders leave their jobs at Riot, EA, Scopely, and other established gaming firms to build Web3 games on Solana,” Anatoly Yakovenko, CEO of Solana Labs, said in a statement.&nbsp;



In 2020, the global gaming market was valued at $173.7 billion and is expected to jump 81% to $314.4 billion by 2026, according to a <a href="https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/global-gaming-market#faqs" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">report</a>. In general, there has been an increasing amount of interest in the Web3 gaming industry over the past year with game builders and developers moving from traditional gaming industries to build on Web3, said the Solana Ventures spokesperson.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">“With the shift in focus to in-game assets, blockchain has the ability to solve a number of problems including eliminating fraudulent items, creating scarcity, and incentivizing more purchases by making items transferable across games,” they said, adding, “Play2Earn opportunities will also continue to monetize the industry, something that has historically been a major draw for gamers.”</blockquote>



Additionally, play-to-earn games like Axie Infinity have been able to provide players with rewards that were up to several times their monthly salaries, creating a “blockchain-based” living wage, said the Solana Ventures spokesperson. Axie users can trade, breed and battle non-fungible token (NFT) characters in the digital world. The gaming company passed<a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/axie-infinity-developer-scores-152m-in-series-b-funding-nearing-3b-valuation/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"> $2 billion in all-time trading volume </a>in September, according to DappRadar.



“We believe this new technology stands to cultivate the next phase of gaming innovation including the development of new decentralized models for gaming and while also bringing new builders into the space,” they added.



Earlier this week, Mythical Games closed a $150 million Series C round led by <a target="_blank" href="https://cms.blockworks.co/a16z-launches-400m-seed-fund-to-expand-into-new-technology/" rel="noreferrer noopener">Andreessen Horowitz</a>, a16z, Blockworks reported. The next-generation gaming technology studio’s valuation is now $1.25 billion, meaning it has reached unicorn status in under three years after being founded in 2018.