Andreessen Horowitz, Silicon Valley’s popular private Venture Capitalist firm, has launched a $300 million crypto fund, called a16z. They are also bringing in their first ever female general partner, Katie Haun, to manage the fund focused for the advancement of blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies.
Right from the beginning, the VC firm has helped grow the crypto ecosystem and has been involved with various funding rounds of cryptocurrency companies at a great length. The investment firm has also invested in Coinbase, a popular marketplace for the digital currency. Moreover, the company has completed at $20 million round of TrustToken and also participated in the seed round of Basis, a stable cryptocurrency and $28 million round of Harbor, a compliance platform for tokens.
The firm believes that blockchain technology makes use of trust by leveraging game theory and math to maintain the integrity of a distributed ledger. This trust builds a strong relationship between developers, users, and platforms giving rise to an array of uses cases such as payment protocols, digital goods, and distributed competition. They said,
“In an era in which the internet is increasingly controlled by a handful of large tech incumbents, it’s more important than ever to create the right economic conditions for developers, creators, and entrepreneurs.”
The announcement comes right after Bitcoin has hit one of its lowest value, inviting cynicism and speculations for its future growth. The $300 million fund has a long-term focus and Co-Founder Marc Andreessen advocates for crypto and clearly mentions,
“We have an “all weather” fund. We plan to invest consistently over time, regardless of market conditions. If there is another “crypto winter,” we’ll keep investing aggressively.”
The a16z crypto fund will be investing in all sorts of teams, be it seed stage or later. The firm wants to invest in non-speculative use cases in a market that is currently driven by speculations. The timing of this fund announcement signifies that one of the most prolific Silicon Valley investors will be contributing to the entire ecosystem, irrespective of market conditions.
