Crypto wallet, data provider Blockchain supports innovation with new VC fund

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Blockchain, a Luxembourg-based entity that offers a cryptocurrency wallet and supplies data to the blockchain community, is considering launching a venture capital (VC) fund. The goal is to support innovation in the blockchain and crypto spaces and, if it’s able to get up and running, would expect to have $50 million ready to invest in new businesses.

Blockchain is backed by Sir Richard Branson and Google and is now discussing the VC opportunity with potential investors. The money would go toward various purposes, including investments in equity and crypto offerings in the blockchain space, and the effort is being led by Sam Harrison, a finance guru who joined the company just over a year ago.

The company has not publicly made a big deal out of the potential new operations, but Harrison has been a little more forthcoming. He states on his LinkedIn profile that he is the co-founder of “Blockchain.com Ventures – a $50m Venture Capital Fund,” which he says has already invested in companies such as Sliver.tv, Nodle, Coindirect and Origin Protocol.

Blockchain is also behind The PIT, a new exchange platform that was developed with the assistance of individuals previously tied to Goldman Sachs, the New York Stock Exchange, Google and TD Ameritrade. It uses a matching engine, Mercury, that can execute buy and sell orders in “40 to 50 microseconds,” much faster than other platforms.

It introduced a new hardware crypto wallet last year and has continued to work on developing operations across a number of crypto-related sectors. Founded about eight years ago, the company has raised $70 million to finance its own operations and continues to work at becoming the blockchain’s leading firm.

Apart from its headquarters in Luxembourg, Blockchain also has offices in London, Vilnus and New York. On its board of directors is found, among others, former Barclays CEO Antony Jenkins.

Former U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron inaugurated the company’s new London office when it opened in 2017.

Among its other investors, Blockchain counts Microsoft, through its M12 venture fund, and Salesforce Ventures. When Branson decided to put his money into the company in 2017, he asserted that Blockchain was “at the cutting edge of a growing industry.”