It is safe to say blockchain technology continues to attract a lot of investors. After many years of hyping this technology, now is the time to start building some real-world projects and solutions. Even so, the industry as a whole attracted a lot of seed funding throughout 2017, according to data provided by GlobalData.
Blockchains Continue to Mature
It is evident there are many different technical ventures that companies and individuals can invest in as of right now. Not all of these projects will achieve long-term success, though, and it remains unclear what the future holds for the blockchain industry in this regard. Judging from the amount of seed funding blockchain companies have received, there is nothing to worry about just yet.
More specifically, 40% of blockchain companies received seed funding throughout 2017. That in itself is pretty interesting, as it shows there are still a lot of potential use cases waiting to be unlocked. Although not all companies focusing on blockchain will succeed, overall interest in this industry is still high as of right now.
Some blockchain-related companies have also secured Series A and Series B funding. While 31% of blockchain companies received Series A funding, 20% of them successfully raised Series B funding. This goes to show investors are less keen on investing additional capital in blockchain companies until those ventures can deliver the goods. Most of them will struggle to do so in a timely fashion, as building a blockchain infrastructure takes a lot of time.
Only nine percent of blockchain companies secured Series C funding in 2017. That may seem like a low number, but it is on par with digital businesses, payments startups, IoT startups, and AI companies. Even so, companies in all of those industries often undergo Series D, E, and F funding rounds as well. While blockchain certainly shines in seed funding, the overall scope of investment is not there yet for this industry.
It will be quite interesting to see how all of these industries evolve throughout 2018. Considering that we had so many blockchain ICOs in 2017, it seems a lot of companies are moving away from pursuing traditional investment. At the same time, there are still a ton of companies active in this space which have purposefully decided not to pursue an initial coin offering model. It creates an interesting mix of blockchain companies, to say the least.
With such a high degree of seed funding, blockchain startups are clearly leading the charge, based on the information from GlobalData. No other industry comes even remotely close to this amount, although AI startup seed investment is also quite high. It is now time to ensure companies continue to attract funding as their services mature, but it is evident that will not be all that easy.
