A proposal to create a $200 million fund dedicated to early-stage Web3 startups was submitted on February 26 by Mantle Core on the BitDAO governance forum. The ecosystem fund aims to boost the adoption of the Mantle network among developers and Dapps.
Mantle is an Ethereum layer-2 network developed by the BitDAO ecosystem. According to the proposal, a capital pool of $200 million will be deployed in the Mantle ecosystem over the next three years. The BitDAO Treasury will provide $100 million in USD Coin (USDC), while another $100 million will be provided by external matching capital from “strategic venture partners.”
Funds that have expressed interest in participating include Dragonfly Capital, Pantera, Folius Ventures, Play Ventures Future Fund, Spartan, Lemniscap, Selini Capital, Cadenza Ventures and QCP Capital, according to Mantle’s proposal.
[DISCUSSION] Mantle EcoFund@0xMantle has posted a discussion suggesting:
✅ Authorization to establish Mantle EcoFund 1 from a capital pool of $200M (catalyzed by the target size of $100M from BitDAO).
✅ First capital call authorization: $10M USDC from #BitDAO Treasury.
– BitDAO (@BitDAO_Official) February 26, 2023
If approved, Mantle EcoFund and its venture partners will participate in the project with a 1:1 investment ratio. Web3 startups raising pre-seed, seed, and series A rounds will be targeted by ecosystem funds.
The fund is proposed to have an active investment period of three years, plus two years of optional extension, a Mantle spokesperson told Cointelegraph via email. Initial fund operators are proposed to be Mirana Ventures, Bybit and BitDAO venture partners, with an investment committee that includes representatives from Mirana Ventures, Mantle, BitDAO and Bybit.
“The target fund to invest in more than 100 projects distributed in Mantle and have times in invested capital (MOIC) of 1.5x cumulative performance through the fund’s lifecycle,” said Mantle’s spokesman.
Management fees will be “industry standard,” with a 2% fee to support the operational costs of the EcoFund team, including sourcing, due diligence, legal, portfolio support and fund administration.
Across the crypto industry, similar initiatives are driving adoption and innovation. Last year, Ethereum scaling solution Polygon launched a $100 million fund aimed at increasing access to decentralized finance, onboarding users and accelerating adoption.