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  • Heroes of Mavia Closes $5.5 Million Seed Round Led by Binance Labs, Genblock Capital

    Heroes of Mavia Closes $5.5 Million Seed Round Led by Binance Labs, Genblock Capital

    Hanoi, Vietnam, 21st January, 2022, Chainwire

    Heroes of Mavia, a blockchain-based play-to-earn massively multiplayer online (MMO) strategy game developed by Skrice Studios, is thrilled to announce the closing of its $5.5 million seed funding round. The project will use the proceeds to develop the game, attract top talent, and grow the community.

    The seed round saw participation from well-known venture capital firms that have shown a strong interest in blockchain gaming. This round is led by Binance Labs, and other investors include Genblock Capital, Delphi Digital, Mechanism Capital, Alameda Research, Animoca Brands, YGG, YGG SEA, ExNetwork Capital, Double Peak Ventures, Merit Circle, Hashkey Capital, and many angels. 

    Bill Chin, Head of Investment at Binance Labs, said, “At a time when play-to-earn gaming is exploding in interest globally, we believe Mavia and the team behind it is positioned to be one of the top AAA-titles in the space.”

    “We are thrilled to have such strong backing from some of the largest and most influential investors in the space. We are proud to say that all of our partners share our vision for making Heroes of Mavia a leader in Blockchain Gaming, and we plan on pushing the boundaries of what Play-to-Earn games are capable of,” said Tristan Chaudhry, Managing Director of Skrice Studios.

    Built on Ethereum, the game is set in a fantasy-theme island called “Mavia,” where the player is a commander of a base. Each player’s objective is to grow their base and army using resources obtained from attacking others’ bases. It promises to change the NFT gaming landscape with its intricate mechanics, exciting gameplay, and unique monetization features.

    Heroes of Mavia delivers AAA quality graphics and brings cutting-edge features to GameFi. It allows every base in the Mavia ecosystem to be live streamed during attacks and defenses. All the battles are permanently recorded and can be viewed by anyone, forever. 

    To get started, players need to occupy at least one plot of land through one of three methods – owning land, renting land or partnering with a landowner. One plot of land can hold just a single base in the game. By enabling players to rent from or partner with a landowner, the game makes it easier for them to get started with little or no upfront capital.

    Heroes of Mavia uses a dual token model, with MAVIA being the governance token that gives holders the ability to vote on important decisions and direct the future of the Mavia game. MAVIA token is also used for buying, selling and renting NFTs on the Mavia Marketplace.

    RUBY is the in-game play-to-earn token within the Heroes of Mavia game. Players earn RUBY by battling the enemy armies and bases. The token is used for over a dozen in-game purchases, NFT upgrades as well as skins and decorations.

    About Heroes of Mavia

    Heroes of Mavia is a AAA MMO strategy game allowing players to buy land, build a base and battle other players for the in-game token RUBY. There exists three NFT types in the game — Land, Heroes and Statues, each of which can be bought and sold on the Mavia marketplace. RUBY is the main play-to-earn currency in the game, and can be earned by winning battles against other bases.

    For more information, please visit: Website  |  Twitter  |  Telegram | Discord
     

    Contacts
    • Nania Tran
    • nania@mavia.com
  • Cudos and Sfera Technologies Partner for Fast Processing of Raw Earth Observation Satellites’ Data

    Cudos and Sfera Technologies Partner for Fast Processing of Raw Earth Observation Satellites’ Data

    Cudos, a decentralized computing network blockchain, and Sfera Technologies are partnering as per a press release on January 13.

    Cudos and Sfera Technologies Partnership

    Details indicate that Cudos will supply computing capabilities to Sfera’s decentralized space infrastructure, Ephemeris. The objective of this partnership is to lower costs and reduce complexities. 

    Ephemeris is Sfera’s core product and exists as a multichain protocol designed to expressly provide reliable integrated satellite data delivery and process management systems leveraging the reliability and security of the blockchain.

    Supplying Ephemeris with Computing Power

    Ground station networks can access various critical services, including storage, computation, and efficient data distribution from Ephemeris. 

    Notably, this integration makes Ephemeris whole. It will rely on the decentralization of the Cudos computing network to compute and process data beamed from raw earth observation (EO) satellites, converting them to imagery products quickly and more securely. 

    Raw earth observation satellites are mostly used for monitory purposes helping track and manage resources, respond to humanitarian crises, and overly allow sustainable development. 

    With Cudos in the picture and Ephemeris armed with computing, it is also possible for the otherwise rigid legacy services like satellite ground segments to integrate distributed ledger technologies.

    According to the CEO of Sfera Technologies, Zdravko Dimitrov, fusing with Cudos provides the missing puzzle:

    “By integrating with CUDOS, Ephemeris obtains another piece of the puzzle — computing power to crunch raw Earth Observation (EO) data from satellites into commercial imagery products. Rigid legacy services like the satellite ground segment can now leap straight into Web3 territory, and it’s inspiring to be at the helm of this transformation together with Cudos. Considering our shared vision on decentralized data ecosystems, we’re eagerly looking forward to the great space industry solutions that will come out of our partnership.”

    The Global Space Industry Could Hit $1 Trillion by 2040

    Statistics show that the global turnover space economy increased $19 billion in 2020, rising to $449 billion. This impressive growth further presented a 55 percent expansion from the state of affairs in the early 2010s. 

    Continuing the past decade’s trend, the global space industry will likely post even more growth going forward, reading from the level of investment and improving operational efficiencies. According to Morgan Stanley, the global space industry could generate at least $1 trillion in revenue by 2040. However, in the short-and-medium term, the global bank states that opportunities could arise from satellite broadband Internet access.

    A Decentralized Solution to Reduce Risks

    Therefore, as the number of EO satellites increases, the demand for its emitted data rises in tandem. In turn, this demands the provision of scalable and distributed storage and computing infrastructure capable of delivering solutions with low latency. At the same time, with the rise of privacy preservation needs, opting for a decentralized solution with built-in protection features is suitable. 

    Turning to a centralized cloud instead of relying on individual infrastructure may have been the easier way out. However, the growing risks of amassing critical data in a single provider’s storage systems introduce risks, especially around control of data delivery pipes which may be throttled or even blocked. Cudos will supply decentralized computing power from a high-performance base layer, enabling large-scale data processing.

    The announcement is ahead of Cudos’ scheduled launch of its mainnet in February. Sfera Technologies joins the fast-growing Cudos ecosystem, including MELD—a high-profile project set for launch in Cardano–, and Tingo Holdings International, that’s tackling poverty in Africa.

    About Cudos 

    Cudos is powering the metaverse bringing together DeFi, NFTs and gaming experiences to realise the vision of a decentralized Web 3.0, enabling all users to benefit from the growth of the network. We’re an interoperable, open platform launchpad that will provide the infrastructure required to meet the 1000x higher computing needs for the creation of fully immersive, gamified digital realities. Cudos is a Layer 1 blockchain and Layer 2 community-governed compute network, designed to ensure decentralized, permissionless access to high-performance computing at scale. Our native utility token CUDOS is the lifeblood of our network and offers an attractive annual yield and liquidity for stakers and holders.

    Website | Docs | Twitter | Telegram Group | Linkedin | Youtube | Discord | Facebook | Medium | CoinCheckup

  • Google Shows Interest in Crypto, Hires Former PayPal Exec to Lead Payments Division

    Google Shows Interest in Crypto, Hires Former PayPal Exec to Lead Payments Division

    Key takeaways:

    • Google is reforming its digital payments strategy after a failed push into banking, hires PayPal’s Arnold Goldberg to lead the payments division
    • Bill Ready, Google’s president of commerce told Bloomberg that “Crypto is something we pay a lot of attention to,” and added that the company’s plans will evolve with user demand
    • Google Pay already supports the integration of credit cards by crypto companies, such as Coinbase and Bakkt; there are plans for more such partnerships in the future

    Google’s new strategy for its payments division includes crypto

    Google, a part of the broader technology conglomerate Alphabet, has hired former PayPal executive Arnold Golberg to chart a new course for the search giant’s payments division after its failed push into banking. Bloomberg reports that the company will be “employing a broader strategy,” and will be open to a wider scope of financial solutions, including digital currencies.

    Speaking to Bloomberg, Google’s president of commerce Bill Ready discussed the possibility of integrating crypto into the broader suite of Google’s financial service:

    “Crypto is something we pay a lot of attention to. As user demand and merchant demand evolves, we’ll evolve with it.” 

    Before his stint at Google, Goldberg was the chief product architect and general manager at PayPal, which has been rapidly expanding its portfolio of crypto services ever since it first announced the support for Bitcoin, Ethereum, BCH, and Litecoin in October 2020.

    The news of Google’s teaming up with Goldberg to restructure its approach to crypto and financial services, in general, comes three months after the company partnered with digital asset trading platform Bakkt to become its main provider of cloud computing services. As a part of the partnership, Bakkt’s virtual Visa debit cards became available for use on Google Pay, as long as transactions are made in fiat currencies. The search giant inked a similar deal with Coinbase earlier in 2021, when the leading US crypto exchange announced its users would be able to pair their Coinbase Card with Google Pay and Apple Pay.

    Ready told Bloomberg that Google intends to make more deals with different cryptocurrency firms in the future, but there are no plans for native cryptocurrency transaction support in the near future. 

    The Google news had little impact on the broader crypto market – Bitcoin continues to struggle to break the $42,000 resistance and is trading in a narrow range as of late, while the total cryptocurrency market cap barely budged in the last 24 hours. 

  • Intel to Enter Bitcoin Mining Industry, Plans to Unveil Energy-Efficient ASIC at ISSCC Conference

    Intel to Enter Bitcoin Mining Industry, Plans to Unveil Energy-Efficient ASIC at ISSCC Conference

    The leading desktop chip manufacturer Intel is looking to unveil a new type of ASIC at the upcoming International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC) during the demonstration session scheduled for February 23, titled “Bonanza Mine: An Ultra-Low-Voltage Energy-Efficient Bitcoin Mining ASIC.”

    Key takeaways:

    • ISSCC is an annually held international forum where companies and hardware engineers can present advancements made in solid-state circuits and “Systems-on-a-Chip.” This year’s ISSCC will be held in downtown San Francisco and will last from Feb. 20 to Feb. 24.
    • According to Tom’s Hardware report, Intel’s demonstration session will likely include a video presentation of the new processor codenamed “Bonanza Mine.” It is not yet known how far along is the new ASIC in terms of development and whether will we see a consumer-grade product or an early prototype at the ISSCC.
    • While Ethereum and the majority of other digital currencies can be profitably mined with regular desktop GPUs and CPUs, Bitcoin requires far more computing power and specialized ASICs (Application-specific integrated circuits) to meet the demands of the power-hungry Proof-of-Work (PoW) network.
    • Intel’s foray into the BTC mining market will likely make the space, currently dominated by companies such as Bitmain and MicroBT, far more competitive.
    • The North American region has become the leading BTC mining hub after Chinese authorities effectively shut down the cryptocurrency mining industry within the country last year. In early January, Marathon announced it is expanding its BTC mining operation with the acquisition of $900 million worth of Bitmain’s mining equipment, which is one of the biggest deals of its kind to date.
  • Chingari’s Social Token GARI Tops $100M in Trading Volume in the First Day After Going Live on 12 Crypto Exchanges

    Chingari’s Social Token GARI Tops $100M in Trading Volume in the First Day After Going Live on 12 Crypto Exchanges

    Key takeaways:

    • GARI token’s trading volume surpassed $100 million on the first day after debuting on 12 crypto exchanges, including OKX, Huobi Global, and KuCoin
    • Chingari is India’s fastest growing short-video sharing platform, boasting 35 million active users and 110 million downloads
    • GARI is currently up more than 225% compared to its OKX initial sale price of $0.20, which is good for a $30.3 million market valuation

    Chingari’s social token GARI has enjoyed huge success on its first trading day after going live on 12 crypto exchanges, including OKX, FTX, and KuCoin, on January 18. GARI topped $100 million in trading volume, showcasing strong community engagement and interest in one of India’s fastest-growing social media apps.

    GARI token volume surpasses $100M as the leading social token gains more than 200% in a single day

    Chingari is India’s quickest growing short-video sharing social media platform, sporting 35 million active users, 110 million downloads, and in excess of 160 million content views per day. On January 18, the much-anticipated launch of GARI across 12 international digital asset trading platforms drew an enormous amount of interest from the broader crypto community, generating more than $100 million in trading volume and pushing the price of GARI up by more than 200%.

    GARI serves as the backbone of Chingari’s social network, allowing users to directly engage and support their favorite artists and content creators, while giving creators the opportunity to monetize their videos and merchandise in a way that’s not possible on traditional social media platforms, like Facebook or TikTok.

    Chingari’s CEO and co-founder Sumit Gosh stated he was excited about GARI’s impressive international debut and added:

    “Cryptocurrency in India has been untapped when it comes to the curators and with GARI we would be capturing the potential market. We shall be maintaining the leadership position across the short video apps platforms.”

    Last December, Chingari reached a major milestone when it claimed the top spot on India’s Google Play, beating out social media giants Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat for number one spot.

    GARI has a circulating supply of 45.8 million, and a max supply capped at 1 billion coins. Solana-based DLT architecture allows GARI to facilitate up to 65,0000 transactions per second (TPS) while retaining extremely low transaction costs, which provides ample opportunity for various NFT use cases and seamless distribution of crypto incentives.

    At the time of this writing, GARI is trading at $0.6673, up more than 225% in comparison to its OKX initial sale price of $0.20 (expressed in USD).

    Buy/Sell GARI
  • ProBit Global Onboards Top Gaming Guild Crypto Gaming United to Strengthen its Global P2E Network

    ProBit Global Onboards Top Gaming Guild Crypto Gaming United to Strengthen its Global P2E Network

    As part of its commitment to the broader P2E ecosystem, ProBit Global has extended its network of GameFi partnerships to include one of the top gaming guilds in the space, Crypto Gaming United.

    The CGU team will participate in an upcoming AMA on ProBit Global’s official Telegram channel on January 25, 2022, 07:00 UTC to provide updates on development. A 500 CGU prize purse will be distributed to the 10 event winners during the live Q&A session and interactive quiz.

    Backed by angel investor Mark Carnegie who led the $5M seed round alongside Chrono.tech CEO Sergei Sergienko, CGU secured an additional $2.5M in funding following a six-second closeout for its IDO held on the platform’s proprietary exchange TimeX.

    CGU follows in the footsteps of other GameFi pioneers by offering scholarships, or up-front capital in the form of NFT assets such as Axies for gamers to accumulate SLP tokens in Axie Infinity.

    A key differentiating factor behind CGU is its holistic approach to supporting the vast economic opportunities in the metaverse featuring training courses aimed at equipping gamers with long-term monetizable skills. The learning platform helps open up diverse economic opportunities alongside its freelance gig platform LaborX where scholarship applications can be submitted.

    Additionally, a pension plan representing between 3-5% is currently undergoing testing as part of the team’s bid to increase the financial safety net for all of their onboarded users.

    CGU valuation is based on an index of the entire ecosystem’s revenue and digital asset holdings, making it somewhat of a bet on the future development of the Metaverse and interlinked gaming community which includes the rollout of a future DAO.

    CGU holders can earn staking rewards and governance rights along with early access to the network’s expanding number of gaming titles and features as investors continue dropping significant amounts of funding into P2E and crypto games.

    ABOUT CGU

    Crypto Gaming United (CGU) is a platform that brings people from developing countries together to build a new virtual economy and earn a sustainable income, while learning new digital skills and engaging with the global blockchain gaming community.

    ABOUT PROBIT GLOBAL

    ProBit Global is a Top 20 crypto exchange worldwide servicing crypto enthusiasts with unlimited access to trade and buy Bitcoin, Ethereum and 700+ altcoins in 1000+ markets.

    PROBIT GLOBAL IS A BRAND TRUSTED BY MILLIONS OF USERS

    200,000+ community members
    1,000,000+ monthly active users
    3,000,000 monthly web visitors
    50,000,000 users on partnering aggregators and wallets such as CoinMarketCap
    User interface of Multilingual website supporting 41 different languages
    Marketing and community support in 8 key languages

    Join our active programs and get huge benefits!

    1. Trading Fee Discount: Buy PROB, pay trading fees with PROB & get as low as 0.03% trading fee

    2. Referral Program: Earn 10-30% of trading fees for referring friends to ProBit

    3. ProBit Exclusive: Subscribe to 50% off Top 200 tokens

    4. Auto Hold Campaigns: Hold tokens and get 6% annualized returns

    ProBit Global: www.probit.com

    ProBit Telegram: https://t.me/ProbitEnglish

  • Coinbase and Mastercard Are Joining Forces to Make Buying NFTs More Accessible

    Coinbase and Mastercard Are Joining Forces to Make Buying NFTs More Accessible

    Publicly traded cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase and global payment processor Mastercard are partnering to make non-fungible token (NFT) purchase experience more accessible and less complex.

    Key takeaways:

    • “Coinbase wants to simplify the user experience to allow more people to join the NFTs community,” noted Coinbase in a Tuesday’s blog post. Leading cryptocurrency exchange is reportedly trying to follow the same formula that made Bitcoin accessible to millions of users around the world and use it to make NFTs more widely available.
    • One of the hurdles standing in the way of making NFTs as readily available as other digital currencies is the lack of a closer relationship between NFT platforms and global payment service processors.
    • To this end, Coinbase is working with Mastercard “to classify NFTs as “digital goods,” allowing a broader group of consumers to purchase NFTs.” Coinbase also hinted at “a new way” of paying with Mastercard’s credit cards, saying that the feature is “coming soon,” but didn’t reveal any additional information about the upcoming service.
    • Coinbase seems to be mounting a considerable push into the NFT space, having announced its own NFT marketplace in October 2021. The sector is currently dominated by OpeanSea, which is presently having the best month of its five-year existence in terms of transaction volume and the number of active traders.
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  • Microsoft Ramps Up Its Metaverse Plans With $68.7B Acquisition of Activision Blizzard

    Microsoft Ramps Up Its Metaverse Plans With $68.7B Acquisition of Activision Blizzard

    Key takeaways:

    • Microsoft is buying Activision Blizzard for $68-7 billion in cash to boost its presence in the gaming sector and lay the foundation for the metaverse
    • The acquisition that is planned to be finalized in the 2023 fiscal year will elevate the Microsoft gaming division to the third spot, behind Tencent and Sony
    • Activision Blizzard’s stock price spiked by 40% in pre-market trading

    The acquisition of Activision Blizzard “will form the building blocks for the metaverse”

    Tech giant Microsoft has announced it will be buying Activision Blizzard, one of the largest gaming companies and owner of some of the most popular gaming franchises, such as Call of Duty, StarCraft, Tony Hawk’s, World of Warcraft, to name a few.

    Microsoft’s video game catalog is set to expand with popular titles such as “Call of Duty” and “World of Warcraft”. Image Source: Microsoft

    According to Microsoft, Activision will be acquired for $95 per share in an all-cash deal that will be finalized in 2023. The massive investment will solidify Microsoft as the third-largest game developer in the world, trailing only Chinese gaming giant Tencent and Microsoft’s main rival in the gaming console space Sony.

    Satya Nadella, chairman and CEO of Microsoft, commented on the importance of gaming for the development of metaverses:

    “Gaming is the most dynamic and exciting category in entertainment across all platforms today and will play a key role in the development of metaverse platforms. We’re investing deeply in world-class content, community and the cloud to usher in a new era of gaming that puts players and creators first and makes gaming safe, inclusive and accessible to all.”

    According to a recent report conducted by market research firm Emergen Research, the global metaverse market revenue is expected to grow from $180 billion in 2021 to $829 billion in 2028, with mobile gaming platforms estimated to experience more considerable relative growth than desktop gaming. 

    It is no surprise then that Microsoft seems to be focusing on boosting its presence in mobile markets and intends to bring popular gaming titles, like “Halo and “Warcraft”, to users’ pockets through the Xbox Cloud Gaming service.  “With games like “Candy Crush,” Activision Blizzard´s mobile business represents a significant presence and opportunity for Microsoft in this fast-growing segment,” explained Microsoft.

    Metaverse has been a hot topic in tech circles ever since Facebook announced its rebrand to Meta late last year and thus showcased its commitment to the rapidly growing sector. Metaverse projects in the cryptocurrency space have experienced a massive boost in their popularity as a result, with open metaverse worlds like The Sandbox and Axie Infinity reaching market valuations higher than some of their traditional gaming counterparts. Microsoft’s latest move will undoubtedly bring even more attention to the highly competitive sector.

    While the price of Microsoft’s stock (MSFT) took a relatively minor hit of 2.43% when the news of the planned acquisition was made public earlier today, the shares of Activision Blizzard jumped more than 25% on the news and reached their highest value since August 2021.

  • Animoca Brands Raises $358 Million in Latest Founding Round, Valuation Spikes to Over $5 Billion

    Animoca Brands Raises $358 Million in Latest Founding Round, Valuation Spikes to Over $5 Billion

    Animoca Brands, a Hong Kong-based gaming and venture capital company, as well as the owner and developer of a highly popular crypto metaverse, The Sandbox, has announced it raised $358.89 million at over $5 billion valuation in the latest funding round led by Liberty City Ventures.

    Key takeaways:

    • According to a press release, Animoca Brands will continue to pursue its mission of “bringing digital property rights to online users through the use of blockchain and NFTs,” which the company considers being an integral part of building the open metaverse.

    • Over the years, Animonca Brands has provided financial backing to some of the more prominent cryptocurrency projects in the broader blockchain sector, including digital wallet MetaMask, NFT marketplace OpenSea, and blockchain game Axie Infinity.

    • The latest funding round has brought the total amount of capital Animoca Brands has raised to date to over $500 million, while its subsidiary The Sandbox separately raised $93 million in fresh capital during a financing round that took place in November 2021.

    • Animoca Brands is a vital player in the GameFi sector, which is quickly becoming one of the fastest-growing areas of the global video game industry – as noted in the press release, the global video game market is estimated to generate $829 billion by 2028, up from $180 billion in 2021.

    • Investments in blockchain gaming are picking up steam as of late. Earlier today, Mechanism Capital launched a $100 million fund dedicated to Play-to-Earn (P2E) mobile games, while both Solana Ventures and Gala Games launched their respective $100 million gaming funds in the past month.