The Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)-compatible blockchain Monad recently raised $225 million in a funding round led by crypto venture firm Paradigm. This constitutes the largest crypto raise so far in 2024 and signals that investors see potential for Monad to become a major player in decentralized finance (DeFi) as an alternative to both Ethereum and Solana.
Founded in 2022 by Jump Crypto alum Keone Hon, Monad is building a layer-1 blockchain that aims to provide the best of both worlds for crypto users. It seeks to be as capable as Ethereum for supporting extremely high traffic while remaining faster, cheaper, and more secure than both Ethereum and Solana. By being EVM-compatible, Monad hopes to tap into Ethereum’s large developer community while offering improved scalability compared to the current Ethereum network.
Non-Ethereum blockchains like Solana have gained popularity for DeFi due to their speed and lower fees. However, Solana has suffered repeated outages while trying to scale. Monad hopes to avoid these issues by offering full EVM compatibility along with a more optimized underlying architecture designed for scale from the start.
Attracting top crypto investors like Paradigm, Electric Capital, and Greenoaks signals that Monad’s approach has strong potential. Electric Capital Managing Partner Avichal Garg stated they are excited about Monad’s “parallelized EVM [which] can unlock a 100x improvement in throughput in the EVM ecosystem.”
With 90% of crypto developers currently working across multiple chains using EVM, Monad appears positioned to tap into this large talent pool. As the dominant force in crypto, Ethereum captures the majority of users and developers - something Monad hopes to leverage through EVM compatibility while improving on Ethereum’s scalability challenges.
This $225 million raise constitutes the largest crypto funding round so far in 2024, highlighting investor enthusiasm for Monad’s vision of a “best of both worlds” blockchain. With its EVM focus and plans to launch an optimized, scalable network, Monad aims to become a mainstay platform for crypto users seeking an alternative to the limitations of Ethereum and outages of Solana. Only time will tell if it can deliver on this ambitious goal, but this massive raise shows investors are betting big on Monad’s potential.