Google’s investment arms pump $1.56 billion into blockchain companies

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: Blockdata, a crypto research firm, released an updated blog post on Tuesday showing who have been the most active investors in the crypto scene from September 2021 to June 2022. Researchers noted major tech firms including Tencent, Microsoft, PayPal, Samsung and Alphabet (Google) add big money in crypto companies and startups. Some of these companies, such as PayPal, have been a long-time and vocal supporter of blockchain technology (thanks in part to co-founder Peter Thiel). Still others, like Google, have been much more subdued. […] What Google chooses to invest in can help answer where the company wants to see blockchain technology go, or what it might want to incorporate into its own technological infrastructure. In the report, Alphabet, the parent company of Google, sat at the top of the pile, showing that it had put over $1.5 billion into crypto companies over four investment rounds. Some of the company’s pooled funds went to the likes of Dapper Labs, the company behind the NBA’s Top Shot and UFC Strike licensed video NFTs. The company was also behind CryptoKitties, an NFT-based game that has seen the price of its products tank.

What makes this more complicated is that there are actually two of Google’s investment arms involved in this fundraising. GV (Google’s investment arm once called Google Ventures) helped fund Dapper Labs and another crypto-infrastructure company Voltage, which received $6 million in total investment at the start of 2022. CapitalG, the company’s independent private equity firm, had a hand in 550 million dollars. picked up by Fireblock, a crypto custody company, as well as investment by digital currency venture capital firm Digital Currency Group Of course, this was all before the latest crypto crash, which has seen a slew of once-strong crypto companies lay off thousands of workers. Although this isn’t the first time we’ve heard of Google’s parent company Alphabet with their heavy financial interest in blockchain companies. They have been investing in this technology since 2016, according to the Blockdata report. Earlier reports showed that they had put money into crypto companies like Ripple (which just like many small altcoins since the recent crypto crash, is not doing too hot). Google had previously made much broader investments across a wider range of blockchain-based companies. That was then, and this is now. Blockdata analysts said this limited investment slate is an attempt to make concentrated bets on a small set of companies, but even with executives’ stated hopes for blockchain technology, it’s hard to see any investment really panning out.

Although it was fourth in the size of its contributions, Samsung led the pack in the number – and startling variety – of crypto ventures it made to account for over an incredible 13 investment rounds. A total of $979.26 million went to the likes of Dank Bank, an NFT platform to try and monetize “memes and other iconic moments in internet history.” They put more of their money behind Yuga Labs, the creators of the Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTS. They shelved the investment in March, but in April, users on the group’s official Instagram and Discord were defrauded of nearly $13.7 million worth of NFTs. Still, the founders said many of BAYC’s rather oddball initiatives such as a Bored Ape “Metaverse” are still going strong. They are also putting money into Sky Mavis, the creators of the crypto-based play-to-earn game Axie Infinity. This investment probably didn’t work wonders for them considering that the token bridge suffered one of the biggest hacks in crypto history earlier this year. The game has struggled to recover from that blow, even though players had already left the platform before hackers hijacked bridge funds. “Blockdata’s research shows that 81 of the top 100 public companies have made some form of past or current crypto investment,” adds Gizmodo. “2021 saw the absolute highest amount of total investment in blockchain companies. Funding totals have increased by a factor of 14 from 2019 to last year.”