Paradigm plans $1.5 billion fund to expand into AI, robotics

Paradigm is seeking to raise as much as $1.5 billion for a new fund that would expand its scope into frontier technologies, including artificial intelligence and robotics, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The San Francisco-based venture capital firm has built its reputation backing digital asset protocols and web3 infrastructure since its founding by former Sequoia partner Matt Huang and Coinbase co-founder Fred Ehrsam.

Paradigm, overseeing $12.6 billion in assets as of late 2024, launched a $2.5 billion vehicle in 2021 that backed projects including Uniswap and StarkWare, and followed with an $850 million early-stage fund in 2024.

The planned fund comes as investment in AI and robotics continues to accelerate in 2026, reflecting the growing industrialization of autonomous systems.

The trend has encouraged firms to pursue opportunities in physical AI, where machine learning models are increasingly being deployed directly into hardware-driven and enterprise automation workflows.

Paradigm invested $50 million in Nous Research and recently partnered with OpenAI to develop EVMbench, a tool for evaluating AI performance on blockchain-related tasks.

Other crypto-native investors have similarly moved to diversify into adjacent technology fields, seeking to capitalize on the potential convergence between decentralized networks and machine learning systems.

                    **Disclosure:** This article was edited by Vivian Nguyen. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.