The TON Foundation, the entity that runs The Open Network (TON) blockchain Unveiled A new accelerator program for emerging projects, allocating up to $25 million to supported projects this year.
“The funding, which is provided by the TONCoin Fund, a $250 million ecosystem fund dedicated to founders building on TON, will funnel investments into leading projects across a variety of sectors, with a specific focus on decentralized finance (DeFi),” the foundation said in a statement.
Toncoin is the native coin of the blockchain. According to the foundation, under the plan, each investment will be between $50,000 and $250,000 per project.
Fund for crypto projects
Financial support for selected projects will be accompanied by partnerships and mentorship by accelerator partners including: GotBit, a hedge-fund and market-making business, and a supplier of trading and risk management solutions; Web3port, developer of tools connecting Web3.0 startups and contributors; TONStarter, the primary fundraising platform on the TON blockchain; TEB, an incubator for Web3 developers headquartered in South Korea; and Cypher Capital, a multi-strategy crypto investment firm based in the United Arab Emirates.
“We are excited to unveil the TON Accelerator Program as our ecosystem continues to grow and attract new talent,” commented Justin Hyun, Head of Incubation and Development at the TON Foundation.
“This is just the beginning of many different incubators that will be supported in the future. The funding is part of our local hub rollout strategy and our ecosystem will work to attract new developers as well as successful repeat founders, based in various key global locations is based on,” according to Hyun.
The foundation said submissions are currently open.
“Projects must be built on TON (i.e. supporting TVM and the TON smart-contract language). In addition, projects must be MVP ready (Proof-of-Concept or Prototype teams) if support in marketing, business and technology is required. requires more technical support for the first phase grant),” according to the statement.
Bill Qian, president of Cypher Capital, said that “[w]What the TON Accelerator program is doing is taking and refining the well-known incubator principle within the Web2 ecosystem and developing it using Web3 protocols and ways of working. We are delighted to play our part in this next generation event.”
“This is a program that is unique within the Web3 universe today,” Qian said.
TON was originally created by the team behind Telegram with whom it is still associated, and has been operated as an open-source community project since 2020.