Bitmain’s Funding Round Raises Its Value To $12B
Bitmain is known to be among the largest Bitcoin mining companies in the world. Given its success over the last few years, it is only expected for it to be valued at $12 billion. This is most especially after the Series B round of funding.
The Funding
Reports say that Bitmain was able to acquire around $300 million to $400 from Sequoia Capital subsidiary Sequoia China. It also included the U.S. hedge fund Coatue and the Singapore-based governmental investment fund EDBI. The Beijing-based company received a total of $50 million on September 2017 in a Series A funding round courtesy of IDG Capital and Sequoia Capital.
Sometime in June this year, the company’s very own CEO Jihan Wu revealed that he is open to plans to conduct an initial public offering or IPO in Hong Kong. According to him, an IPO in the said region should be suitable enough to allow early investors to cash all of their funds. Experts say that Bitmain’s ability to raise the aforementioned figure should make it another China-based Bitcoin mining giant. And like its competitors, being a BTC mining giant means seeking an initial public offering (IPO).
Main Competitors
One of Bitmain’s main competitors, Canaan Creative, announced on May that it would jumpstart an IPO on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in July. In an interview, the China-based company’s co-chairman Jianping Kong said that the company prefers listing that is outside mainland China. This is due to the fact that they are a global business.
Bitmain Technologies was founded sometime in 2013. The privately held company is among the many entities that develop Bitcoin mining hardware and ASIC chips. The firm reportedly held around 70 to 80 percent of the market for the leading digital currency’s mining hardware, an achievement it reached in February this year. Bitmain is also a company that operates one of the largest Bitcoin mining pools called Antpool. Earlier this year, the company was reported to be into the development of Ant Creek mining centers in the United States.
Interestingly, Bitmain is also geared to invest in Opera Ltd.’s $115 million IPO. The mining company basically plans to buy at least $50 million in shares through a private placement under the aegis of Tospring Technology Ltd, which is simply another name for Bitmain. It is worth noting that this is not the first time for the company to dominate in an investment campaign. In May this year, it managed to back Circle’s $110 million investment round.