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This report will explore how various forces have shaped the current blockchain landscape. On the other hand, technologists — nerds — are transfixed by it. They see within it enormous potential and spend their nights and weekends tinkering with it. Investors in ICOs hope to turn a profit by buying early access to potentially foundational blockchain protocols and applications, just as early investors into bitcoin and ethereum did.
Indeed, ICOs appear to be locked in something of a feedback loop with major cryptocurrencies — most notably, bitcoin and ethereum. A run-up in cryptocurrency prices this year has created paper gains for investors, many of whom have looked to diversify into ICOs.
More available capital has also contributed to an increasing number of blockchain entrepreneurs opting to raise funds via ICOs as opposed to traditional equity financing, in turn fostering higher demand for cryptocurrencies broadly, and so on. Cumulatively since January , the number of ICOs should surpass the number of equity deals in October , underscoring hype around the financing mechanism.
Teams holding ICOs are building decentralized blockchain applications across verticals, ranging from asset management to social networks to prediction markets. Importantly, teams holding ICOs are adamant that they do not represent securities offerings — which would put them on the wrong side of the law — and instead market their coins or tokens as part of an entirely new asset class altogether. For example, bitcoin is a token that provides ownership of a unit of account on the Bitcoin ledger.
In the same vein, companies justify large pre-product ICOs by arguing that scarce tokens provide future utility within decentralized networks. Venture investing has shifted over time, with VCs first backing companies exploring bitcoin as currency, then focusing on private blockchain providers catering to financial services and other verticals, and today investing in the token economy.
The recent boom in cryptocurrencies and ICOs has had a material effect on the number of blockchain teams looking for financing, with traditional equity deals on track to set a new record of in , up from in VC-backed deals specifically should grow at a similar rate, to a run-rated 77 in Meanwhile the proportion of later-stage deals Series D and later this year is staying consistent with figures.
At the same time, given that ICOs currently account for the vast majority of blockchain seed deals, the sector is seeing a substantial uptick in seed-stage companies that are not represented in equity financing data.
Looking at VCs and investments, the number of active VCs with at least one blockchain investment in a given year has hit 95 in YTD, setting them on pace to hit by the end of the year. This suggests VCs are showing renewed interest in the sector, after dropping steeply in Cryptocurrency returns have proven both difficult for VCs to ignore and difficult to capitalize on, as typical venture investment mandates require equity investments and the regulatory climate around ICOs remains uneven.
As a result, brand-name VCs have invested into ICO cottage industries, most prominently cryptocurrency hedge funds. Over 70 of these funds have sprung up since the start of , many with venture funds as investors. VCs have often looked to gain exposure to cryptocurrencies by investing in startups correlated with cryptocurrency prices and trading volume, such as exchanges or mining companies. Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures highlighted this volatility in a recent blog post, writing: BitPay , a notable exception, received January seed funding and has stayed true to payments processing, allowing merchants to transact in bitcoin.
Farther-ranging blockchain applications have also seen venture backing, especially as the conversation has shifted from Bitcoin to blockchain at large. Private blockchains — as opposed to public blockchains, like Bitcoin and Ethereum — are often run by centralized administrators and customized for internal organizational use cases, making them more palatable to corporate interests concerned with privacy and security.
More corporates are starting to invest in the sector, with the number of active corporate investors rising to a new high of 91 in YTD. Notably, the number of active corporate investors is closing in on the same metric for VCs, which has seen 95 active investors in YTD. Japan-based SBI Holdings is the top corporate investor, with investments into 8 unique blockchain companies. Google comes in second, with 6 investments that span private enterprise services LedgerX , and merchant services Veem.
The firm — which is the third most active corporate investor — recently announced the launch of T Zero t0 , a blockchain-based trading platform for capital markets. In addition to investing, banks have also partnered with blockchain companies and other corporates on blockchain trials and projects.
Consortia fall somewhere between private enterprise blockchains and public blockchains. This creates a middle option, offering both the security of private blockchains a requirement by many corporations and the network effects of public blockchains.
Collaboration is definitely not a given, especially in the highly competitive fields such as financial services that blockchain is immediately targeting. Digital Asset a private blockchain and Blockstream a bitcoin-focused engineering outfit have since contributed codebases to Hyperledger, implying continued cooperation between private blockchains, public blockchains, and consortia. In July , Hyperledger announced a production-ready blockchain, Fabric 1.
JP Morgan Chase and Microsoft announced early on that they would be utilizing Ethereum to develop their own blockchain offerings — JP Morgan with its in-house private blockchain, Quorum, and Microsoft with its blockchain-as-a-service module for Azure. The EEA diverges from Hyperledger in its governance. Microsoft and the EEA plan to utilize the public Ethereum blockchain, and have little say in its technical development.
The consortium has also announced the creation of seven working groups, including healthcare, supply chain, and insurance, though trials and proofs-of-concept have yet to seriously materialize.
However, R3 still counts more than member banks and financial services firms, and is forging ahead on a number of projects and partnerships. Venture investors are still looking for real blockchain usage beyond speculation, as most teams exploring blockchain use-cases have been hard pressed to find users.
This is an immediate requirement for the sector to mature. Judging from the data presented in this report, though, the future seems bright, as investment in blockchain technology evolves in new and innovative ways.
As the landscape evolves, the future of investment in the space will likely take on forms yet to be imagined.