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Crypto VC Firm Archetype Set to Close $150 Million Fund

Crypto VC Firm Archetype Set to Close $150 Million Fund

Archetype, an early-stage crypto venture capital firm, plans to close a $150 million fund on May 2. It will be the second fund for the year-old firm, which named Katherine Wu as a venture partner earlier this year after poaching her from Coinbase Global Inc.

The new fund will focus on startups in a variety of different areas of the crypto industry, said Archetype founder and general partner Ash Egan. Egan said in an interview that crypto is on the brink of greater mainstream adoption.

“It feels like we're not that far away from an application that gets to 100 million active users,” he said.

Egan’s confidence comes amid lagging prices for digital currencies and fears of a broader slump. Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market value, fell Friday to below $40,000 and has lost about 14% of its value this month. Ethereum, the second-largest, has tumbled about 13%. 

Wu, who has been working in crypto for five years, said this kind of volatility is nothing new. “​​Long-term crypto investors really need to have guts of steel,” she said. 

Based in New York, Archetype has invested in a range of crypto startups including decentralized finance platform Polynomial and nonfungible token platform POAP Inc. 

Archetype’s new fund will be used for both token and equity investments, Egan said. He said the fund has already locked in three investments, including in two decentralized finance platforms and a startup focused on bridging traditional banking and crypto. The firm also plans to at least double its four-person team over the next 12 months.

Wu said that in the crypto space, where deals are plentiful, she values working at a smaller firm. At Coinbase, “I wasn't really learning as an investor,” she said. “I wasn’t really learning anything about the companies even because we had so many deals.” 

©2022 Bloomberg L.P.