Telegram’s blockchain developer joins unicorn ranks at $1b valuation

The Open Platform’s billion-dollar milestone marks a maturing moment for the TON ecosystem, which is leveraging Telegram’s 900M users to make crypto as seamless as texting. With $28.5 million fresh funding, TOP is betting big on blockchain’s mass-market moment.

On July 3, The Open Platform announced a $28.5 million Series A raise led by Ribbit Capital, with participation from Pantera Capital, valuing the company at $1 billion and making it the first unicorn in the TON ecosystem.

TOP said the funds will fuel its expansion into Western markets, including regulatory licensing and compliance efforts, while accelerating development of Telegram-native blockchain apps, from wallets to AI tools.

Unlike many crypto ventures, the round was strictly equity-based, with no token component, signaling a deliberate pivot toward traditional venture backing. For Telegram, which has long tiptoed around the regulatory edge of blockchain adoption, the rise of The Open Platform as a billion-dollar player shows how its network has evolved from being just a distribution channel to a robust on-chain operating system.

The TON ecosystem’s silent growth engine

The Open Platform’s $28.5 million raise can be seen as a strategic move to scale an ecosystem that has quietly become one of crypto’s most effective onboarding tools.

Unlike most popular blockchains that rely on speculative trades and DeFi yields to retain users, TON’s growth has been driven by something simpler: Telegram’s chat interface. TOP’s flagship product, the Telegram Wallet, eliminated the friction of seed phrases and external apps, allowing users to send Toncoin (TON) as easily as a message.

Since going live in 2021, The Open Network has seen over 15 million wallets created through Telegram, with viral hits like Notcoin and Hamster Kombat bringing in millions of first-time crypto users.

With a unicorn status and fresh capital injection, The Open Platform wants to double down on embedding blockchain more deeply within everyday mobile experiences.

The developer said a significant portion of the funding will support expansion into markets where crypto integration often hits a wall, not due to lack of users, but because of outdated rules, fragmented enforcement, and tech stacks not built for mobile-native crypto engagement.

TOP now finds itself in a rare position: already embedded within a messaging app that reaches nearly a billion users, and now capitalized to build the compliance stack to match. Whether that’s enough to deliver on its stated goal of “onboarding a billion users into crypto” remains to be seen.