Metaverse App BUD Raises $36.8M, Plans NFT Marketplace

BUD, an app that enhances the metaverse experience, has raised $36.8 million in a new funding round, a Medium blog post said Monday (May 23).

BUD lets users make 3D avatars, virtual assets and “colorful experiences,” according to the company, using a drag-and-drop method and no coding.

The company’s total funding is now about $60 million, the post said.

BUD’s plans could see the company debuting a NFT marketplace “soon,” the post said. Founders Risa Feng and Shawn Lin, both ex-Snap engineers, say NFTs, or nonfungible tokens, can help creators earn passive income by reselling their in-game assets with the sale history recorded on a blockchain.

The funding round was led by Sequoia Capital India, the post said.

See also: Meta Says Metaverse Will Be Worth $3T

PYMNTS quoted Nick Clegg, Meta president of global affairs, saying the metaverse could be hugely transformative for the internet.

The report notes that a study, funded by Meta, found that the metaverse could add $3 trillion to the global economy by 2031.

Clegg compared the transition to the metaverse to the way browsing has evolved from desktop computers to smartphones.

“Skepticism is a natural reaction to something that sounds like it’s straight out of a science fiction novel — in a way, it is — especially when there are wider societal concerns about how tech operates in the two-dimensional world,” Clegg wrote.

The metaverse is set to be a virtual world where people can interact. It will be available through virtual reality and augmented reality headsets and apps.

Clegg added that the metaverse would be similar to the internet as it is now, with a variety of “technologies, platforms and products” making it up.

He said it won’t be run by just one company, instead being supported by a slew of them along with civil society and the public sector, and individual creators.