Key Highlights
- Animoca Brands has made a strategic investment in Ava Labs, the team behind the Avalanche blockchain.
- The partnership focuses on expanding Avalanche adoption in Asia and the Middle East, targeting RWA tokenization and digital identity.
- Both firms will collaborate on integrations, capital deployment, and ecosystem growth using Animoca’s regional network.
Hong Kong-based digital assets firm Animoca Brands has announced a strategic investment in Ava Labs, the company behind the Avalanche blockchain. Alongside the capital deployment, the two have entered a partnership aimed at driving adoption of the Avalanche ecosystem, with a particular focus on Asia and the Middle East.
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The financial terms of the investment were not disclosed as of press time.
What the partnership covers
Under the agreement, Animoca Brands and Ava Labs will work together on capital deployment, product integrations, and strategic advisory support for projects building on Avalanche. The initial focus areas include entertainment, real-world asset tokenization, and digital identity.
The collaboration leans on Animoca’s existing regional infrastructure and institutional relationships in the Middle East and Asia, which Avalanche ecosystem projects can tap into as they scale commercially.
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John Nahas, Chief Business Officer at Ava Labs, said, “Animoca Brands brings experience across consumer, institutional blockchain ecosystems, and a wide network of portfolio companies. This partnership supports Avalanche ecosystem expansion in Asia and the Middle East – two regions seeing sustained growth in digital asset activity. We’re thrilled to collaborate on initiatives that improve user access and interoperability for applications building on Avalanche.”
Omar Elassar, Head of Global Strategic Partnerships and Managing Director for the Middle East at Animoca Brands, said: “We’re very deliberate about the ecosystems we partner with.”
He noted that Avalanche’s scalable subnet architecture with EVM compatibility makes it suitable for sovereign and institutional deployments, adding that the alignment fits with the types of ecosystems Animoca Brands supports through strategic investments.
He further said the initial focus will be on identity integrations and RWA tokenization, with a broader goal of supporting builders within the Avalanche ecosystem and boosting its adoption.
Why Asia and the Middle East
The regional focus is not random. Animoca Brands has been steadily building its Middle East presence over the past year. The company opened its first office in the region in 2025 and appointed Omar Elassar as managing director. In February 2026, it secured a Virtual Asset Service Provider (VASP) license from Dubai’s VARA, allowing it to offer broker-dealer and investment management services to institutional investors from the emirate.
In Asia, Avalanche has been making its own inroads. South Korea, in particular, has seen growing institutional interest in the chain, with Mirae Asset Global Investments signing a Memorandum of Understanding with Ava Labs to explore tokenized funds on Avalanche. The blockchain has also seen traction in stablecoin development and enterprise deployments across the region.
Combining Animoca’s on-the-ground relationships with Avalanche’s technical infrastructure is what the two firms are banking on here.
Animoca’s broader expansion play
This partnership fits into a larger pattern for Animoca Brands, which has been aggressively expanding its strategic footprint. The company is currently pursuing a Nasdaq listing through a reverse merger with Currenc Group, with the deal expected to close in 2026.
It has also formed RWA-focused partnerships with Fosun Wealth Holdings and FinChain in Asia, and announced a joint venture with Standard Chartered and Hong Kong Telecommunications to apply for a stablecoin issuer license in Hong Kong.
With a portfolio of over 600 blockchain investments and growing regulatory approvals in key jurisdictions, the Ava Labs partnership adds another layer to what Animoca is building across the institutional and enterprise blockchain space.
For Avalanche, the deal brings something it needs in these markets: access. And for Animoca, it adds another ecosystem to its expanding list of strategic bets.
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