thecryptobasic.com
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has disclosed that he personally invested $200 million to support the development of the network’s partner chain, Midnight.
Speaking in a recent interview, Hoskinson emphasized his deep commitment to the Midnight project. Beyond publicly endorsing Midnight, he revealed backing it with substantial personal funding.
Key Points
- Cardano’s partner chain Midnight received no venture capital support.
- Charles Hoskinson invested $200 million to support Midnight’s development.
- Despite the substantial investment, the Midnight Foundation distributed $NIGHT widely to users across eight blockchains.
- Hoskinson emphasized that Midnight is designed to serve both traditional financial institutions and decentralized finance ecosystems.
Hoskinson Funded Midnight Development with $200M
In his commentary, Hoskinson offered insight into the initial development of Midnight, noting that it deliberately avoided VC backing. The Cardano founder said he made a personal $200 million investment to ensure independent development and user-first priorities.
Despite this significant financial commitment, Hoskinson and the Midnight Foundation distributed the $NIGHT token through a large-scale airdrop. They allocated tokens across eight blockchains, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano, XRPL, and Solana, promoting broad access and cross-chain participation.
Unity Over Unhealthy Competition
Notably, Hoskinson noted that this structure aims to eliminate the adversarial dynamics common in the crypto industry, where rival tokens often compete aggressively for dominance.
By encouraging open distribution and interoperability, Hoskinson believes Midnight can foster cooperation rather than conflict, ultimately supporting wider adoption and long-term ecosystem growth.
Moreover, this vision aligns with Hoskinson’s effort to unify the blockchain industry. As part of that push, he engaged key industry leaders, including Ripple executives, to end previous hostilities and expanded the $NIGHT airdrop to participants across multiple blockchain ecosystems.
Midnight Is for Everyone
Meanwhile, Charles Hoskinson emphasized that Midnight serves everyone, including both traditional finance (TradFi) and decentralized finance (DeFi) businesses. By bridging these two worlds, the network aims to deliver a privacy-first, cooperative blockchain solution designed for universal participation rather than zero-sum competition.
Furthermore, Midnight is scheduled to launch as a partner chain on the Cardano mainnet toward the end of March 2026. Hoskinson described the upcoming launch as a major milestone, highlighting his excitement as the project moves from years of academic research into real-world deployment.
Notably, with major entities such as Google and Telegram already adopting Midnight, he underscored the significance of seeing the network operate at scale. Ultimately, Hoskinson revealed plans to introduce additional features after launch to enable decentralized application developers to build more advanced and versatile solutions on the network.