NEAR
The blockchain for AI — unified commerce layer for assets and agents
Crypto
📍 San Francisco, CA
Founded 2018
Current Valuation
$10B
as of 2022-Q2
DECACORN
NEAR is a layer-1 blockchain originally launched in 2020 by former Google Brain researcher Illia Polosukhin (a 'Attention Is All You Need' Transformer paper co-author). NEAR pivoted in 2024-25 to position itself as the blockchain for AI agents, with infrastructure for autonomous transactions and cross-chain commerce. Last equity round priced at $10B in April 2022.
Company Profile
Growth
Pivot from generalist L1 to AI-native chain (User-Owned AI thesis)
Last Round
Series strategic — $350M (Apr 2022) · Lead: Tiger Global
IPO Status
no imminent plans
Founders & Key People
Illia PolosukhinAlexander Skidanov
Investors
Tiger Global · Andreessen Horowitz · Three Arrows Capital · FTX Ventures · Republic Capital
Products
- NEAR Protocol L1
- NEAR AI agent stack
- Chain Signatures
- NEAR Intents
Competitors
Solana · Aptos · Sui · Ethereum L2s
CryptoBlockchainAIL1Decacorn
Private-company numbers are not real-time. Reflects publicly disclosed valuations from press releases, news reports, and tender offers as of 2022-Q2. Refreshed quarterly.