Silver Lake Leads $150M Round in NFT Platform Genies

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Genies, a non-fungible token (NFT) platform, raised $150 million in its recent funding round led by private equity firm Silver Lake to further its Web 3 ambitions. The New York Times DealBook first reported the news.

• The U.S.-based company's latest funding round values it at $1 billion, the company said Tuesday. This investment will help support it as it provides tools to create and sell characters online.

• "Sometimes it's a small company like this, and other times it's huge, large companies that need to be transformed," Egon Durban, the co-chief executive of Silver Lake, told DealBook.

• In May last year, Genies raised a $65 million round led by Mary Meeker's Bond Capital with participation from Dapper Labs, Polychain, Coinbase Ventures, Hashkey and others.

• In December, the company partnered with the Universal Music Group, enabling Universal's musicians to create digital versions of themselves.

• Genies and Silver Lake were not immediately available for comment when contacted by CoinDesk.

Read more: Dapper Labs, Coinbase Ventures Join $65M Investment in Avatar Startup Genies

UPDATE (April 12, 14:19 UTC): Changes headline, adds link to press release.