Blockchain company Chia Network Inc. has raised $61 million from a group of investors, including Richmond Global Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz, Bloomberg has learned. According to the source, during the investment round, Chia's market cap has reached $500 million.
Chia's president and COO Gene Hoffman has reported the company intends to conduct a traditional initial public offering (IPO) by the end of the year, although he is also not ruling out a merger with the "right" special purpose acquisition firm. Hoffman added:
"Our goal has always been to go public relatively quickly as that will significantly clarify our regulatory environment and allow customers to use currency to hedge public market volatility, which is different from other coins. We want to make digital currency easier to use than cash."
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Hoffman has highlighted the investments raised will become the "rocket fuel" to further expand the team and implement the vision of creating a trading and payment system that will be used by authorities, banks and other financial institutions.
Chia's devs consider their crypto to be environmentally friendly, as it is mined with data storage devices and requires a lot less energy than Bitcoin mining. Richmond Global Ventures managing partner David Frazee has said Chia is auditable, secure and compliant. This, he has said, makes Chia suitable for authorities and corporations. Frazee has added:
"Chia is what Bitcoin would look like if it was designed with knowledge from the last 13 years."