Huobi Offers Millions in Funding for Help Building Its Own Blockchain

Cryptocurrency exchange Huobi announced Wednesday plans to allocate 30 million of its Huobi Tokens to fund the creation of the company's own open-sourced blockchain protocol.

The fund, currently worth around $166 million based on CoinMarketCap data, will be used to launch the Huobi Chain Project, which is also aimed to establish a decentralized autonomous organization on top of the proprietary blockchain, the company said at a press conference in Singapore.

The blockchain would serve as a platform for users to participate in token fundraising events, as well as to vote for which tokens should be listed on Huobi, said Chen Guang, a director at the company's ecosystem development arm.

While the firm also envisions ultimately migrating its exchange to the blockchain system to evolve it into a decentralized exchange, such a move is still uncertain as the move would require higher levels of efficiency and security.

Chen believes the future of the blockchain ecosystem should be a combination of centralization and decentralization.

Chen indicated that the company is currently talking to up to 10 well-known leaders from open-source blockchain projects who might help form the committee, but declined to reveal the names on the list.

The committee will further nominate a list of candidates for Huobi Chain Project's potential global lead. After nomination, users will jointly vote for the preferred candidate using their Huobi Tokens.

Also in today's press conference, Cai Kailong, chief strategy officer of Huobi Group, announced that the company is launching a new exchange in Australia with expectations of a launch by the end of June.

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