By
Godfrey Benjamin
April 12th, 2024
Chinese cryptocurrency exchange Huobi’s blockchain incubator Huobi Labs has revealed its plans to create a US$1 billion fund to finance local start-ups.
Chinese blockcain incubator Huobi Labs that is a part of the world’s third-largest cryptocurrency exchange Huobi has revealed its plans to set up a US$1 billion fund with a view to provide financial support to domestic start-ups working in the blockchain sphere.
It has been announced that Huobi Labs signed strategic cooperation agreement with Tianya Community Network Technology, a Hainan-based social networking platform. The two organizations will jointly create a “Global Cultural and Creative Blockchain Lab” based in Hainan Province, China.
“Under the background of the new era of Chinese socialism characteristics, we have given Hainan Special Economic Zone a new mission of economical reformation,” Hobi team wrote in their official blog post.
This initiative is to be carried out in a line with a national-level strategy to increase the development level of the province that was elaborated and implemented personally by President Xi Jiping. There are also some plans to move the headquarters of Huobi from Beijing to Hainan in 2018 to be located in Hainan Ecological Software Park.
In 2018, the Huobi Group also plans to create a blockchain research institute in collaboration with the world’s top universities, build a 40,000 sq. m blockchain incubator and support cooperation with leading companies with a view to establish 10 GlobalBlockchain+ labs.
Huobi was established in 2013 and has quickly managed to become one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in China. Today this cryptocurrency exchange is known all over the world, supports a wide range of cryptocurrencies and, according to the data provided by CoinMarketCap, its trading volume in recent 24 hours amounts to $1.8 billion. Nevertheless, you can’t access Huobi’s official site in China without using a VPN service.
Chinese government has a very skeptic and ambiguous approach towards blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies. Though it has banned Initial Coin Offerings and transactions between renminbi and digital assets at exchanges, at the same time it tries to encourage digitalization and create an innovation-friendly environment.
That’s why there are some hopes that the situation will be improved soon and the government will change their attitude towards ICOs. Moreover, implementation of blockchain technologies is also mentioned in the country’s 13th Five-Year Plan for 2016 – 2020.
Although ICOs are banned in the country, China still has a huge number of blockchain-related projects and start-ups that work with this technology and do not issue ICOs. It means that Huobi Labs’ blockchain fund will still have a wide audience comprising of hundreds of promising projects that are looking forward to attracting investments.
According to the recent data, 41% of all the Chinese start-ups that have already received funding this year are blockchain-related projects. And there is little surprise as blockchain today is one of the most auspicious areas for development and a great number of talented specialists do not want to miss their chance to enter the market.