 Ethereum layer 2 SOON raises $22M via NFT sale for mainnet launch 
2025-01-22
Category: None

SOON (Solana Optimistic Network) has raised $22 million through a non-fungible token (NFT) sale to mark the launch of its mainnet and to invest in blockchain infrastructure.
The announcement, made during the launch of SOON’s general-purpose layer-2 (L2) solution, highlights the platform’s use of the Solana Virtual Machine (SVM) as its execution layer.
Built on Ethereum, the SOON mainnet claims to outperform Solana in speed and efficiency, delivering average block times of 50 milliseconds compared to Solana’s 400 milliseconds.
The $22 million NFT sale was led by Hack VC, with participation from firms including ABCDE, Anagram, Hypersphere, SNZ Capital, ArkStream Capital, GeekCartel, PAKA, Web3Port, MH Ventures and IDG Capital.
The launch of the COMMing SOON NFT mint was a “pivotal moment” for the project, according to Joanna Zeng, co-founder and CEO of SOON.
“While many founders chose a traditional route and raised exclusively from VC, we chose to offer equal deal terms for VCs and our community, ensuring a fair launch token distribution and allowing both to participate on an equal footing,” Zeng told Cointelegraph. 
A significant portion of the $22 million will be allocated to support the growth of the SOON ecosystem and develop its infrastructure, the announcement stated.
SOON manages to outperform other blockchains in terms of speed by decoupling the transaction processing unit (TPU), Zeng told Cointelegraph:
Community-driven tokenomics
SOON has adopted a community-first approach with its tokenomics, which allocated over 51% of the token supply to the community.
An additional 25% of the tokens were reserved for the ecosystem fund, 8% was allocated to airdrops and liquidity provision, 10% to team and core builders, and 6% was allocated to the project’s treasury.
Fair-launch tokens with no initial allocation for venture capital firms are gaining increasing investor attention following the decentralized launch of the Hyperliquid (HYPE) token.
After staging the most valuable airdrop in crypto history worth over $7.5 billion, the Hyperliquid token came into the spotlight for its decentralized distribution.
This marks a “new era” for fair launch cryptocurrencies, according to Vitali Dervoed, co-founder and CEO of Composability Labs. He told Cointelegraph:
The token “didn’t deploy on any centralized venue” but was launched and fairly priced by the crypto community, added Dervoed.
Composability Labs’ Vitali Dervoed, interview with Cointelegraph’s Zoltan Vardai. Source: Cointelegraph/Zoltan Vardai
In contrast with the Hyperliquid token launch, other cryptocurrencies are launched on centralized exchanges with an allocation to VC firms and early investors. As of May 2024, over 80% of tokens launched on Binance have decreased in value during the first six months after their listing.