Mintable, a marketplace for nonfungible tokens that represent unique digital assets on blockchains, today announced that it has raised $13 million in early funding to scale up its operations and boost growth.

Investors joining the Series A funding round included notable names such as Ripple Labs Inc., an enterprise blockchain solution provider; Animoca Brands, a mobile blockchain gaming developer; Metapurse, an NFT investment fund; and Jon Oringer, founder and executive chairman of Shutterstock Inc.

“Throughout 2021, NFTs have reached mass appeal, having touched almost every sector spanning entertainment, fine arts, sports, and many more,” said Zach Burks, founder and chief executive of Mintable. “As the technology continues to mature and the space rapidly evolves, this is a critical company milestone for Mintable.”

NFTs can represent almost anything, from digital to physical assets. Secured by blockchain technology, they’re stored in blockchain wallets that provide proof of ownership and allow users to buy, sell and trade them and provide transaction histories.

Mintable’s platform is more than just a marketplace. It is also a “minting” platform, which permits its users to create NFTs by building them onto the blockchain and then immediately provision them.

Its platform includes what the company calls a “gas-free” minting feature that allows users to create NFTs, which enables content creators to benefit from creating NFTs without being burdened with excessive transaction fees. That’s important because the process of minting a new NFT can be extremely expensive, which will make them more accessible to mainstream markets.

In the past year, Mintable has seen high growth in its userbase and the number of NFTs posted to its marketplace. About 700,000 items have now been minted on its platform.

The proceeds from the Series A round will be used to assist with acquisition and growth initiatives for individual users and brand clients. The company also intends to continue to expand its marketplace capabilities to make buying and trading of NFTs easy and accessible in order to increase adoption for the mass market.

Numerous NFT marketplaces have sprung up as the industry has expanded over the past year including OpenSea and Rarible – both of which are general-purpose marketplaces – and NBA Topshot, a marketplace that exists only for licensed digital National Basketball Association collectibles.

Recently Mintable worked with Trevor Lawrence, National Football League Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback, who sold an NFT collection on the platform for more than $400,000, streetwear fashion brand Bape and a charity auction in honor of CNBC broadcaster Mark Haines that raised $100,000.

Other participants in the funding round included cryptoasset venture fund 7 O’Clock Capital, Double Peak Group, 640 Oxford Ventures, Digital Finance Group, Spark Digital Capital, Reimagined Ventures and 840 Venture Partners.

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