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DeFi Development, a company vying to be the MicroStrategy of Solana, is expanding internationally through a franchise model.
The company plans to partner with others looking to operate their own Solana treasuries with DeFi’s support. In return, DeFi Development will retain an equity stake in each regional vehicle. The initiative will be branded DFDV Treasury Accelerator.
“Most crypto treasury vehicles today are following the MicroStrategy model. What excites us about DFDV is that they’re not just copying the playbook. They’re evolving it,” said Cosmo Jiang, general partner at investor Pantera Capital. “By combining validator infrastructure, capital markets innovation, and now international expansion via a global franchising model, DFDV is building something structurally different and ahead of the curve.”
Pantera was also an anchor investor in Bitmine Immersion Technologies, an ether treasury firm backed by Peter Thiel and chaired by Fundstrat’s Tom Lee. Kraken, Arrington, RK Capital and Borderless Capital may also support the franchise initiative through a potential investment and treasury and fundraising guidance, as well as infrastructure – which could include validator and custody solutions.
The move comes amid an explosion in companies pursuing crypto treasury strategies or merging with public entities to be able to emulate MicroStrategy’s success investing in bitcoin. In addition to Bitmine, the publicly listed betting platform SharpLink Gaming in May initiated an ether treasury strategy and appointed Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin as chairman of its board. Bit Digital recently exited bitcoin mining to focus on its ETH treasury and staking plans.
Solana is a five-year-old public blockchain platform that promises to provide fast transaction speeds as well as low fees for developers and users. Solana’s value is up 7% over the past year, with a nearly 10% gain within the past month, according to Coin Metrics.
In addition to accumulating Solana tokens, the company will acquire validators (the computers that help run the Solana network by verifying transactions) that can be used to “stake” the tokens. Through staking, users earn rewards for locking up SOL tokens on the network.
DeFi Development this week introduced its first SOL per share guidance, saying it plans to reach 1 SOL per share by 2028. With 857,749 SOL held currently and 18.8 million shares outstanding, its SOL per share stands at 0.0457, it said.