The Singapore-based startup BUD has announced that it has secured $36.8 million in Series B round. The round was led by Sequoia Capital India. This round also attracted a prominent list of investors including ClearVue Partners, NetEase and Northern Light Venture Capital. The existing investors included GGV Capital, Qiming Venture Partners and Source Code Capital.

The start-up founded by two former Snap engineers Risa Feng and Shawn Lin in 2019, BUD lets users create bulbous 3D characters, cutesy virtual assets and richly colored experiences through drag-and-drop and without any coding background.

The company declined to reveal its active user size but said its users have created over 15 million custom experiences i.e., virtual spaces with gameplay that others can join since the app launched in November.

Virtual assets, including costumes and accessories that users design for characters, have changed hands more than 150 million times on BUD’s marketplace.

These transactions are clearly a promising way to generate revenues, but BUD is not charging commissions for now. Nor has it started monetizing in other means via the app.

“While BUD makes 3D content creation possible for mainstream Gen Z consumers, we will continue to bring blockchain to mainstream consumers and allow our creators to truly own and monetize their creations,” Shawn Lin told TechCrunch. 

BUD is quickly expanding globally and currently has a team of 130 employees. They are headquartered in Singapore and also have offices in Shenzhen and the U.S.