Blockdaemon secures unicorn status with $155M raise

In the venture capital world, a privately-held startup company becomes a “unicorn” when its valuation exceeds $1 billion.

Blockchain infrastructure developer Blockdaemon has secured its status as a crypto unicorn after concluding a $155 million Series B fundraiser, putting the company on track to expand its operational footprint in a significant way. 

With Series B now closed, Blockdaemon’s valuation has swelled to $1.255 billion, the company announced this week. To date, the company has raised just under $190 million, with the latest funding round led by the Softbank Vision Fund 2. Additional investors included Goldman Sachs, Kraken Ventures, Morgan Creek Digital, CoinFund, Matrix Capital Management and Sapphire Ventures.

Konstantin Richter, Blockdaemon’s founder and CEO, said the capital injection will be used to further expand DeFi infrastructure and bridge the gap between digital assets and traditional banking. The company noted that, over the past 90 days, it has more than doubled its managed node count to 18,000.

Blockdaemon provides blockchain infrastructure services to several networks, including Ethereum, Solana, Cardano and Polkadot.

Blockchain infrastructure providers have seen their valuations swell thanks to growing mainstream and institutional interest in digital assets. As Cointelegraph reported, Canada-based Bitcoin (BTC) infrastructure provider Blockstream concluded a $210 million investment round in August, bringing its total valuation to a whopping $3.2 billion. The company followed up that announcement by partnering with a major Australian investment bank around a new carbon-neutral mining facility.

Related: Biden’s infrastructure bill doesn’t undermine crypto’s bridge to the future

Blockchain technology made its way into the United States infrastructure bill last month, albeit not in the manner that many had hoped. As digital assets become more mainstream, the technology that underpins them could increasingly be viewed as infrastructure.