Crypto-focused venture capital firm Paradigm is planning a major strategic expansion, seeking to raise a new $1.5 billion fund dedicated to investing in artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, and other frontier technologies, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.
The firm, which manages $12.7 billion in assets, will continue to invest in cryptocurrency companies but will deploy its existing technical investment team to evaluate deals in these new sectors. Sources familiar with the matter indicated that Paradigm's managers decided against restricting themselves in ways that could cause them to miss attractive investment opportunities. They noted an overlap between crypto and AI, specifically in areas like "agentic payments"—transactions conducted by autonomous AI agents.
This move represents a significant evolution for a firm that launched the largest crypto fund in history at the time—a $2.5 billion flagship fund in November 2021—and publicly announced an $850 million venture fund focused on early-stage crypto projects in 2024.
The expansion follows earlier signals of Paradigm's interest in AI. In 2023, the firm removed Web3 and crypto-specific language from its website, sparking speculation of a pivot. Co-founder and Managing Partner Matt Huang denied this reflected a shift away from crypto but acknowledged the team had been "tinkering" with AI and its convergence with crypto for about three years.
In a subsequent tweet, Huang elaborated: "We've never been more excited about crypto and continue to invest across all stages... the developments in AI are too interesting to ignore." He rejected the framing of "crypto vs AI" as a zero-sum competition, stating both are interesting and will have plenty of overlap.
This strategic shift aligns with broader venture capital trends. Data from the OECD shows that in 2025, VC investments in AI firms totaled $258.7 billion, accounting for 61% of all VC investment—double its share from 2022. Generative AI firms alone attracted 14% of all AI venture capital.
Paradigm's technical exploration in the space is already evident. Earlier in February 2026, Paradigm collaborated with OpenAI to release EVMbench, a benchmark for evaluating how different AI models can detect and patch security vulnerabilities in smart contracts.
