Blockchain company Tessera is bringing direct investments to the Solana ecosystem
as the platform seeks to provide investors with greater access to high-growth private companies without the typical lockup periods associated with venture capital groups, Investing.com has learned.
Led by Chan An, a former Goldman Sachs executive and head of product development and cross-asset structuring at JPMorgan Chase, Tessera said it is targeting the so-called real-asset marketplace in cryptocurrencies—the process of converting traditional financial assets into digital tokens on the blockchain.
This process, known as "tokenization," allows these assets to be traded, stored, and used within the crypto ecosystem similar to any other cryptocurrency. In this case, Tessera has chosen Solana, a high-speed blockchain network designed to process thousands of transactions per second at near-zero costs, as its crypto ecosystem.
The Tessera platform acquires shares of private companies, holds them in financial instruments called special purpose vehicles (SPVs), and then issues tokens. Unlike traditional private equity shares, these tokens are designed to be traded at any time on decentralized exchanges with instant settlement, Tessera announced.
The launch comes amid growing adoption of real assets: according to public statistics cited by Tessera, the market for these assets has exceeded $20 billion in outstanding value. Much of this market is currently based in safe havens perceived by investors, such as US Treasury bonds.
The company added that its initial assets are expected to include exposure to late-stage private groups in the tech and crypto industries. Ahn told Investing.com that Tessera's goal is to provide direct economic exposure to private companies like SpaceX, Kalshi, and OpenAI, structured so that Tessera tokens reflect the underlying returns of direct investments.
Ahn noted that Tessera will charge a 0.2% transfer fee when transferring tokens between digital wallets, and there are currently no management or creation fees.
However, he emphasized that the tokens offer loan participation rights instead of equity shares, and therefore do not carry voting rights in the underlying company. He added that structuring the tokens in this way "significantly shapes" Tessera's approach to international financial regulations.
Tessera currently has no plans to create a project-based or governance token, although this possibility has not been ruled out, Ahn said.