BAYC Team Yuga Labs Raises $285M from ‘Otherside’, Spikes Ethereum Gas Fees

Yuga Labs recently debuted the sale of its Otherside digital land metaverse initiative, generating around $285 million in the process. The sale resulted in a land rush for the tokenized land plots, which in turn dramatically raised Ethereum (ETH) gas fees. Currently, the Ethereum burn rate is at new all-time high (ATH) levels between 2.6 ETH ($7,400) and 5 ETH ($14,270). Furthermore, in the last 24 hours, traders have spent more than $176 million in ETH fees alone.

The Yuga Labs sale of the Otherside virtual land plots, dubbed Otherdeeds, offered a limited supply of 55,000 non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Each digitized token cost around $7,000 and was only available for purchase in ApeCoin (APE), Yuga Labs’ official digital currency. In addition, Otherdeeds sold for far more on secondary marketplaces like OpenSea. The cheapest was 7 ETH, or $19,000 a pop.

Yuga Labs realized revenue of about $319 million after the 55,000 NFTs sold out instantaneously. However, the team decided to pause Otherdeed NFT promotions due to the surging ETH gas fees. Pursuant to this, a message on Otherside’s Twitter handle read:

“The Otherdeed NFT mint is sold out – we are awestruck at the demand shown tonight. Apes and Mutants, the opening of the 21-day claim period is being delayed until the price of gas drops to reasonable levels. We’ll tweet when the claim opens.”

It is also worth noting that in addition to the high gas fees, users experienced failed transactions due to blockchain bottlenecks.

Yuga Labs to Build Own Network Owing to Massive Success of Otherside Initiative

Otherdeed NFTs, which represent digital land deeds in the Otherside metaverse, have now topped the burn leaderboard in the last seven days. The initiative represents a sizable 56%, or 55,816 ETH, of all burns recorded last week. On May 1st, approximately 70,000 ETH was burned, according to Glassnode and Data Always. Because of the network clog and lost funds, Yuga Labs plans to take preemptive measures next time. According to the team behind the popular Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) NFTs, it is looking to build its own blockchain. Yuga Labs also stated that it will port its native ApeCoin over to the new bespoke network. The developer issued a statement that read:

“This has been the largest NFT mint in history by several multiples, and yet the gas used during the mint shows that demand far exceeded anyone’s wildest expectations. We’re sorry for turning off the lights on Ethereum for a while. It seems abundantly clear that ApeCoin will need to migrate to its own chain in order to properly scale.”

Yuga Labs ended its statement by suggesting that the decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) “start thinking in this direction.”

Yuga Labs is a blockchain technology company that launched in 2021. Founded by Greg Solano and Wylie Aronow, the company develops NFTs and digital collectibles.