OpenSea founder pivoted to AI - and won

OpenSea, once one of the most prominent companies in the cryptocurrency industry, has slowly been bleeding users and relevancy over the past four years.

The site went from leading the charge during the NFT (non-fungible token) hype train, seeing over $2.7 billion in volume in a single day in May of 2022, to dwindling to what’s likely to be less than $20 million in turnover for the entire month of August this year.

But two years ago, the founder of OpenSea, Alex Atallah, made a pivot to artificial intelligence by starting a company called OpenRouter – and this week it paid off.

The Death of NFTs and the rise of AI

It may be hard to believe now, but after raising $300 million from the likes of Paradigm and a16z in a Series C round, OpenSea was valued at an astounding $13.3 billion.

That valuation ran into reality, as the NFT boom quickly became a bust, and ten months later, with the collapse of FTX and cryptocurrencies in general, visitors and traders to the site fell off a cliff.

Read more: Former OpenSea manager’s insider trading conviction overturned

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