TON Ventures has raised $40 million for a for-profit venture capital group to support early-stage crypto projects.
A spin off by former senior team members of TON Foundation, TON Ventures will link investors and builders to the opportunities available in the TON blockchain ecosystem, which supports blockchain apps on Telegram, the crypto-friendly messaging service with more than 900 million users.
TON, or The Open Network, said it is crucial for gaming because it offers a highly scalable and efficient infrastructure capable of handling millions of transactions per second, which is essential for real-time multiplayer experiences.
Its integration with Telegram provides an easy entry point for millions of users, enabling seamless in-game purchases and interactions. As seen with the success of Hamster Kombat, Catizen, and Gatto, TON’s unique relationship with Telegram puts mobile gaming at the fingertips of Telegram’s nearly users.
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TON Ventures will focus its support on consumer applications that leverage Telegram’s social graph, Telegram Mini Apps, and tools and infrastructure that support founders as they build mass appeal applications.
In addition to funding, chosen projects will get to leverage the team’s global resources and extensive experience, while receiving benefits such as Telegram Ads, media support, access to strategic partnerships, exclusive access to growth and traffic experiments at TON.
TON Ventures was founded by early members of the TON Foundation and former TON builders. It will be led by Ian W, the former Director of TON Accelerator, and Inal K, former Gaming Lead at TON Foundation. The two have previously worked together supporting successful TON web3 games Catizen and Gatto and perpetuals exchange Tradoor.
“TON and Telegram have created a paradigm shift for web3. With our deep experience in the ecosystem, we believe the highest leverage point is in capital allocation for TON. Now, we have the exciting opportunity to share our insights and strategies for thriving in the unique design space created by TON and Telegram, empowering a new generation of innovators and builders. By connecting visionary investors with cutting-edge projects, we aim to accelerate the growth of the TON ecosystem and foster groundbreaking advancements in decentralized technology,” said Ian W., Managing Director of TON Ventures.
This announcement follows the explosive growth of the TON ecosystem and community over the past few months which saw TON surpass the amount of daily active users on Ethereum, and total assets in use on TON reach a peak of $1.14billion in July, up from $71m since January 1st, 2024. The formation of TON Ventures also comes on the heels of the incredible success that tap-to-earn gaming has seen in 2024, which has brought hundreds of millions of new users to web3 gaming. As evidenced by the meteoric rise of Notcoin, a game that attracted 35 million players in 3 months, and gave away over 90% of its token supply to its community.
TON Ventures connects TON builders with opportunity. Founded by two former members of TON Foundation, Ian W. and Inal K. It is focused on the Telegram design space.
The Open Network (TON) is a global, decentralized blockchain community focused on putting crypto in every pocket. By building the Web3 ecosystem in Telegram Messenger, TON’s vision is to empower 500 million users to own their digital identity, data, and assets by 2028.
The network’s unique architecture also allows for decentralized gaming ecosystems where players truly own their assets, which in the future could be transferred across different games. This enhances player engagement and loyalty by offering real value and interoperability. TON’s focus on user-friendly services makes it a strong foundation for the future of decentralized gaming experiences.
TON blockchain has had the widest success of connected wallets, but also return users for any type of Web3 gaming, far surpassing current UAW and users compared to Ethereum or any other blockchain.
A spokesperson for TON said, “We believe that the first wave of TG/TON adoption will see billion dollar companies formed across DeFi, gaming, ad/marketing, and regulated financial products utilizing the TON blockchain. We will invest across the app level in those verticals as well as tooling that makes the development and monetization process for TON eco apps more seamless and higher quality.”
As far as gaming, Inal K, one of TON Ventures cofounders, was the point person responsible for working with Catizen, Gatto, and The Pixels. That helped TON gain knowledge on gaming success factors.
Right now, most of the new mini-apps TON sees are related to gaming. This makes sense as Wechat miniapps gained their first traction with enterprise apps and gaming. And over time the miniapp composition skewed towards life apps, mobile shopping, practical tools and more.
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