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Binance Labs Will Give Crypto Startups $500K for 10% Stake

Bhushan Akolkar | Aug 25, 2018 | 09:00

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Binance Labs has launched a new Incubation Program for cryptocurrency startups to foster promising early-stage blockchain companies and the ecosystem as a whole. 

Details Of The Incubation Program

The Binance Labs Incubation Program will be extended over a ten-week with the first batch going live by October. During a recent interview with TechCrunch, Binance Labs CEO Ella Zhang said that each batch would comprise of 8-10 blockchain startups. The first batch will gather at San Francisco, California as the company aims at having at least one incubation program every quarter.

The Incubation program aims to nurture blockchain startups through a holistic approach by providing support in the form of seed investment, mentorship, networking and additional services like technical assistance or legal advice. Each startup will receive $500K funding from Binance against the exchange operator getting a 10% equity stake in the business. The investment channels, either crypto or fiat, is yet to be decided.

Additionally, the startups will also receive technical and business assistance by working in close coordination with several other crypto industry experts and professionals, as well as with the current and future batch mates.

Zhang also added that under the new Incubation Program, Binance Labs will be absorbing blockchain startups having a focus on decentralized exchanges, public chain scalability, blockchain infrastructure and security development, payment, wallets, custody, and other fields.

Recently, Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao gave initial glimpses into the company’s upcoming decentralized exchange. To push it decentralization plans further, the company also acquired a decentralized and anonymous mobile wallet application – Trust Wallet.

To tap the global opportunities in the blockchain space, Zhang says that Binance will be conducting this Incubation program in other parts of the world like Asia and Africa. She said:

We’re looking at different cities across the world because blockchain and crypto are international. We see problems and opportunities in different regions with different ways to leverage the blockchain. Binance Labs began to do investments in the past few months and we’ve seen a lot of market hype which is distracting many founders from launching and delivering because there’s a huge demand from investors to get into their project. They need a lot of help to become a more mature team and company in order to really shape what they want to do.

Binance Working On A Multitude of Other Projects

It is not the first attempt by the company to promote development in the blockchain sector. In June 2018, Binance announced a Social Impact Fund investing $1 billion in blockchain and crypto startups. The company has also been seen expanding its business operations across different verticals in the crypto sphere. E.g., Binance collaborated with crypto loan company Libra Credit to provide fiat and crypto loans to BNB token holders.

Binance also collaborated with ChiliZ, a Malta-based blockchain e-sports company, to promote the use of blockchain in the billion-dollar gaming industry. A few weeks ago, CZ shared his vision on the future of blockchain and the role of Binance in shaping the blockchain industry.

Share your views on the growth of the blockchain-startup ecosystem in the comments below. 

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