A proposal was made that sought to create a $200 million fund dedicated to early-stage Web3 startups. sent on February 26 by Mantle Core on the BitDAO governance forum. The ecosystem fund aims to drive adoption of the Mantle network among developers and Dapps.
Mantle is an Ethereum layer 2 network developed by the BitDAO ecosystem. Under the proposal, a $200 million equity fund would be deployed within the Mantle ecosystem over the next three years. The BitDAO treasury would provide $100 million worth of USD Coin (USDC), while another $100 million would be provided by external counterpart 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@0xCloak has posted a discussion proposing:
✅ Authorization to establish Mantle EcoFund 1 of a $200 million equity pool (catalyzed with a target size of $100 million BitDAO).
✅ First Capital Call Authorization: $10M USDC from #BitDAO Treasury.
— BitDAO (@BitDAO_Official) February 26, 2023
If approved, Mantle EcoFund and venture partners will participate in projects at a 1:1 co-investment ratio. Web3 startups that generate pre-seed, seed and Series A rounds will be targeted by the ecosystem fund.
The fund is proposed to have an active investment period of three years, plus a two-year optional extension, a Mantle spokesperson told Cointelegraph via email. The initial fund operator is proposed to be Mirana Ventures, Bybit, and BitDAO's venture partner, with an investment committee comprised of representatives from Mirana Ventures, Mantle, BitDAO, and Bybit.
“The objective of the fund is to invest in more than 100 projects implemented in Mantle and have a multiple of invested capital (MOIC) of 1.5 times the cumulative return over the life cycle of the fund,” said the Mantle spokesperson.
Administration fees would be "industry standard", with a 2% fee to support the operating expenses of the EcoFund team, including sourcing, due diligence, legal, portfolio support and fund administration.
Across the crypto industry, similar initiatives aim to drive adoption and innovation. Last year, the Ethereum scaling solution Polygon launched a $100 million fund aimed at improving access to decentralized finance, onboarding users and accelerating adoption.
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