Nervos and CMB International launch $50M blockchain, DeFi and NFT fund

The Nervos Foundation has announced the launch of a fund in collaboration with CMB International, a wholly-owned subsidiary of China Merchants Bank.

The $50 million fund named “InNervation” will be used to make early investments in startups that are building blockchain-based user-centric products. Decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, dApps, and nonfungible token (NFT) marketplaces will be a particular focus of the investments.

Nervos is a Chinese blockchain project based on a Layer 1, Proof of Work, public permissionless blockchain protocol. It claims to allow any crypto asset to be stored with the same security and immutability as Bitcoin but also enables smart contracts and layer-two scaling.

Nervos launched its Common Knowledge Base (CKB) blockchain network in 2019 with a focus on scalability. The project sought to target DeFi and launched a $5 million fund of its own in February.

According to the new announcement, the $50M fund will be deployed over a three-year period, with startups receiving initial investments between $200,000 and $2 million to support project growth on the Nervos blockchain ecosystem. Priority will be given to projects that are either building on Nervos or have plans to migrate or integrate it into their products.

Hong Kong incorporated CMBI has been exploring the use of dApps with Nervos since 2019 and was an early investor in the blockchain network. The bank is an integrated financial institution providing comprehensive and professional services, owned in entirety by China Merchants Bank (CMB), one of the country’s top commercial banks

Chief Investment Officer at CMBI, Samuel Wang, stated: “They've made no compromises in building their infrastructure and we are committed to supporting Nervos and the expansion of its dApp ecosystem.” Nervos co-founder Kevin Wang stated:

“Our team has been working diligently to ensure developers and teams have access to a variety of tools so they can create, customize, and connect their dApps, protocols, and more across multiple chains,”

Startups that receive funding will have access to a suite of Nervos layer-two tools that have previously been in development and are now ready for use. These include a decentralized exchange, an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatible layer called Polyjuice, and a permissionless rollup framework called Godwoken.

There is also a cross-chain bridge called Force Bridge which is expected to enable support for Bitcoin, Tron, EOS, and Polkadot by the end of this quarter.

The Nervos Common Knowledge Base (CKB) saw huge gains earlier this year as L2 and DeFi development progressed.