Bored Ape Yacht Club Creator Yuga Labs Acquires Rival NFT Company Proof

Yuga Labs, the web3 and lifestyle company behind the Bored Ape Yacht Club, recently announced it had acquired rival non-fungible token creator Proof.

Proof is best known for Moonbirds, a collection of NFT profile pics known as PFPs. The Proof acquisition includes its team, intellectual property, and artistic portfolio, including the Oddities NFTs, Mythics PFPs, and Grails exhibition series.

In addition to Bored Ape Yacht Club, Yuga Labs is known creating the metaverse game Otherside, blockchain art series TwelveFold, and ownership of NFT brands Meebits, CryptoPunks, and 10KTF. Yuga Labs acquired Meebits and CryptoPunks from Larva Labs in March 2022.

“As a company committed to championing art, culture, and community on the blockchain, we’re excited to have PROOF join the Yuga ecosystem,” Yuga Labs CEO Daniel Alegre said in a press statement. “Moonbirds is a collection with great potential and many unifying brand elements with Otherside. We look forward to PROOF Collective becoming an important part of our ongoing art and community engagement efforts.”

Last year, Proof collaborated with Pace Verso, Pace Gallery’s arm for web3 projects, on the NFT project “Archive of Feelings” by multidisciplinary artist Mika Tajima. The project was based on an existing series of large-scale installations by the artist.

According to a press release about the acquisition, Proof CEO and founder Kevin Rose “will undergo a brief handover period before becoming an advisor to the company” and said the two companies’ “will allow us to innovate faster and reach more people.”

It’s worth noting that just over four months ago, Yuga Labs announced layoffs for its US employees, with Alegre writing that Yuga Labs needed to “place our bets on fewer key initiatives” including going “all-in” on Otherside.

According to the Block, trading volumes of Proof’s celebrated Moonbirds collection of NFTs fell from $500 million in April 2022 to consistently below $5 million in monthly sales.

The terms of the deal were not disclosed to the Block. Yuga Labs and Proof did not immediately respond to requests for comment from ARTnews.