Binance will cut ties with its venture capital arm

Binance Labs has become an independent venture capital arm after breaking ties with the Binance exchange.

The free VC fund's portfolio is now valued at more than $10 billion, covers more than 250 projects from more than 25 countries, and has generated more than 14x return on investment, according to a March 12 blog post by Binance Labs.

The arm seeks to invest in early-stage Web3 projects and provide support, including one-on-one mentoring and access to resources within the broader Binance ecosystem.

Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, quietly created a free fund earlier this year. Binance Labs employees have separate contracts from Binance exchange employees.

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The independent VC fund is looking to invest in more Web3 projects. Founders can apply for funding in the Binance Labs Season 7 Incubation program until April 15, 2024.

Binance Labs aims to support promising early-stage founders, according to Yi He, co-founder of Binance and head of Binance Labs, who wrote in an announcement:

“Our support extends to projects committed to long-term development across all chains and ecosystems across multiple sectors. We look forward to seeing each project's continued growth and contribution to the Web 3 ecosystem.”

Binance Labs' previous investment round, season six, received hundreds of applications with an admission rate of 3%. At the end of the competition, only seven promising projects received funding.

These notable projects include startup infrastructure provider Itena, which became the highest-grossing decentralized application (DApp) after breaching $6.8 million in daily revenue at the end of March 8.

Athena Labs launched the USDe cryptocurrency on its public network on February 19, causing widespread concern among investors, as the Ethereum-based cryptocurrency launched with a 27.6% annual percentage yield (APY).

Athena Labs founder Guy Young denied the rumors, explaining that USDe's output is publicly verified and generated by staking returns and shorting Ether's perpetual futures contracts.

Athena currently offers a 60.9% yield per USDE synthetic dollar to over 53,000 users. The project is locked in at a total cost of more than $1.1 billion.

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