Okcoin, Stacks Launch $165M Pledge to Support Bitcoin-Related Projects

Cryptocurrency exchange Okcoin has launched the Bitcoin Odyssey, a year-long pledge among venture capital firms to deploy $165 million into products that accelerate bitcoin (BTC) adoption.

Participating firms include CoinDesk parent company Digital Currency Group, GSR and White Star Capital, among others.

Bitcoin Odyssey was launched along with the Stacks Accelerator and Stacks Foundation. The capital and resources will go toward products being built on Stacks, an open-source network for bitcoin-based smart contracts on the Bitcoin blockchain.

The capital will go toward solutions across Web 3, including the metaverse, play-to-earn games, decentralized finance (DeFi), non-fungible tokens (NFT) and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAO). Other areas of interest include CityCoins and GovTech.

The Odyssey initiative will be led by co-chairs Alex Chizhik, head of listings at Okcoin, and Stacks Accelerator partner Kyle Ellicott.

“We don’t want to create a centralized fund that allocates dictated amounts,” Alex Chizhik told CoinDesk in an interview. “What we want to do is essentially create a matchmaking service between the top-tier VCs and projects.”

“There’s no fixed allocated amount. There’s no minimum amount that we will give to each project,” he continued.

The initial funding target for Odyssey was $100 million, which was oversubscribed quickly, said Chizhik. He and Ellicott said they have continued to take calls from venture capital firms interested in participating in the pledge.