The NFT space shows no signs of slowing down as was proven by NFTPort, an Estonian firm that raised $26 million in Series A funding.
NFTPort is a company that offers an infrastructure platform for NFT developers. According to it, over 30,000 developer teams use the platform, which includes leading companies in the NFT space such as Protocol Labs, and Nifty Gateway.
The NFT Space is Booming
A recent study found that NFTs are the most popular category amongst blockchain startups. In Q1 2022, they raised $2.4 billion in funding, which represents 26 percent of all blockchain-focused funding during the period.
Why This Matters
The NFT space holds great potential outside of art-based NFT projects. However, creating the infrastructure to realize the full potential of the NFT space will not be easy. As such, NFTPort is going to create the backbone infrastructure that enables a whole lot more to be done with NFTs.
With the $26 million it has raised, NFTPort plans to scale its core product offering further, which promises to bring NFTs apps to market in just hours, instead of months.
In the current NFT market, the focus is mainly on digital art. However, NFTs can do much more than that. In short, if anything can be digitized, it can have an NFT associated with it. This NFT serves as the definitive proof of ownership in the digital space, where anything can be replicated in seconds.
While that sounds like a great solution for digital authenticity, the process of creating NFT infrastructure is costly, and there are not enough skilled developers. As a result, a company would need to shell out a huge amount to acquire Web3 developer talent or spend money to train an in-house Web2 team, without any assurance they will not walk as soon as they acquire the skills.
As a result, entering the Web3 space, specifically the NFT space, quickly turns into a multi-million dollar undertaking for most firms. As NFTs are growing in popularity, the demand for NFT-related infrastructure services will continue rising.
According to NFTProt, over 30,000 NFT developer teams already use their services. The company also revealed that as of March 2022, over a million NFT on Polygon had been minted via NFTPort.
The Series A Funding Round Details
Atomico, and Taavet+Sten, an investment vehicle created by Taavet Hinrikus and Sten Tamkivi, led the funding round. Others involved in the funding round were Ott Kukver, Balaji Srinivasan, the former Coinbase CTO, Jutta Steiner, the co-founder of Polkadot, and many others.
AS part of the deal, Sten Tamkivi will join the NFTPort team as a co-founder, while Rain Johanson the former Bolt CTO will join as the CTO and co-founder.
Commenting on the funding round, Irina Haivas from Atomico stated that they had a high conviction in the shift towards digital ownership via NFTs. She noted that for that to happen, a lot of infrastructure development is needed to facilitate the widespread adoption of NFTs needed to be built. According to Irina Haivas, this is where NFTPort comes in. She concluded by stating, “We’re energized by the team’s mission to lay the foundations for an internet that is ownable by citizens.”
