Thirdweb, a platform designed to make it simpler for developers to build Web3 apps, has received a $24 million investment from Katie Haun’s Haun Ventures at a $160 million valuation. According to a statement released Thursday, the round closed last month with investors like Coinbase Ventures, Shopify, Protocol Labs, Polygon, Shrug VC, and billionaire Joseph Lacob. Furqan Rydhan, the creator of Bebo, and businessman Steven Bartlett of Dragon’s Den, the British reality television business program, launched the firm. Thirdweb provides software development kits (SDKs) to construct products from the ground up, a dashboard for developer teams to monitor and control on-chain contracts, and pre-built smart contracts to make products ranging from NFT drops to a marketplace. In an interview with the press, Furqan Rydhan stated, “As a developer, when you’re thinking about web3, the first problem is everything is different than I have learned previously… if I want to create a token or an NFT or a wallet, how do I get started? Smart contracts are also a lot more sensitive than developing for traditional internet software where ‘move fast, ship fast and break things’ was the developer motto – a mistake on the blockchain could cost you $100 million.” DAOs, on-chain teams, and multi-sig wallets are among the Web3 entities that Thirdweb counts. Companies like New York Fashion Week and Afterpay are also using their services to develop Web3 serv...
