Aptos blockchain raises $150 million

The software giant’s Project Diem participants now head up the blockchain firm Aptos Labs, which has secured $150 million to create “the most secure and scalable layer 1 blockchain.”

A $150 million fundraising round is completed by Aptos.

Former Meta workers have raised $150 million in an effort to achieve Diem’s original objectives. In a funding round led by FTX Ventures and Jump Crypto, Aptos Labs raised $150 million on Monday, bringing the total amount raised in 2022 to $350 million. Several renowned investment companies, including Circle Ventures, Multicoin Capital, and Andreessen Horowitz, took part in this most recent round.

1/ Today, we announced our $150M Series A funding round. This is a testament to our team's technical expertise, the strength & activity of our ecosystem and the vision & ethos we all share. https://t.co/GGnn4TY9Lw

— Aptos (@AptosLabs) July 25, 2022

The “safest and most scalable first-layer blockchain” is what Aptos aspires to be, according to an introductory blog post written in February. Former Meta employees that worked on Diem (formerly known as Libra), Meta’s abandoned blockchain-based stablecoin payment system, founded and operated the business. Together with the same group of eminent scientists and researchers, Aptos aims to expand and advance Diem’s work.

According to the February post, “Aptos was created with an emphasis on absolute security, scalability, and credible neutrality – qualities we know well and carry profoundly within us.” It doesn’t really explain how the project plans to achieve decentralization or deal with the infamous blockchain trilemma. Mo Shaikh, co-founder and CEO of Aptos Labs, commented on the campaign in a press statement, saying that Aptos promotes scalability, security, and usability.

• We’ve known for some time that due to issues like outages and downtime, current blockchains aren’t suited for the mass adoption of Web3, he said.

The crypto community’s underwhelming responses

Solana, Celo, and Polygon (an Ethereum second-layer solution), three first-layer blockchains in particular that advertise high transaction rates per second, have experienced significant network outages over the past year, necessitating the coordination of validators to restart and bring networks back online.

Although Aptos now asserts that it is developing a “next-gen layer 1” that should resolve these problems, the crypto community is still skeptical.

Vance Spencer, a co-founder of Framework Ventures, for instance, posed the question to his Twitter followers, “What more can Aptos do than Solana?” Anthony Sassano, a well-known independent Ethereum observer, reacted by criticizing Multicoin Financing, a venture capital firm engaged in Solana, claiming it “gives Multicoin another chance to shed on retailers s.”

what does aptos do that solana doesn't?https://t.co/KAXcSTLzEp

— Vance Spencer (@pythianism) July 25, 2022

Concerns regarding the project’s funding have also been expressed by certain well-known crypto personalities. Shortly after the announcement, renowned crypto trader and co-host of the UpOnly podcast Cobie was asked how many millions it takes to start a blockchain by Evgeny Gaevoy, the founder and CEO of the cryptocurrency company Wintermute. “As much as you can get,” cynically.