Cryptocurrencies are entering the “collared shirt” era, says a16z crypto partner Jay Woollett, as the firm doubles its bet on 10-year infrastructure even as high-profile partners exit amid a new $2 billion fundraising campaign.
summary
- a16z Cryptocurrency Partners has publicly emphasized a 10+ year investment horizon for the sector, comparing today’s market to a pre-internet, pre-AI era.
- At the same time, select partners, including Ariana Simpson and Kofi Ampadu, are exiting or changing roles, underscoring how investment talent will rotate as the industry matures.
- The crypto team is now raising nearly $2 billion in Fifth funding, suggesting that institutional LPs still view blockchains, tokenization, and crypto-AI convergence as long-term core themes.
Jay Woollett, Cryptocurrency Partner at a16z, has published a new article He argues “Finance is not separate from a larger vision; it is part of it,” he said, describing blockchains as essential infrastructure rather than a speculative sideshow. “In a16z and a16z cryptocurrencies, we are looking at the long term: our fund structure is designed for a 10+ year cycle because building new industries takes time,” the partner wrote, likening the current phase to laying railways before new classes of applications come into play. The article stressed that many advanced applications will only emerge as wallets, identities, liquidity, and trust mechanisms mature, echoing a16z research that compares the timeline of cryptocurrencies to the decades of work behind modern artificial intelligence.
A16z encryption doubles down on the long-term thesis
This message is consistent with comments received from a16z Cryptocurrency General Partner Chris Dixon recently said that blockchain technology is “the next foundational infrastructure of the Internet,” and that the industry is going through a long “foundation-building phase” similar to the 1943 neural network paper of today’s AI boom. Dixon also noted that the firm has kept about 95% of its historically invested assets because, as he put it, “selling high-quality assets too early is the worst decision in venture capital.” This position supports a16z crypto’s push into topics such as stablecoins, tokenization, privacy, and prediction markets, set out in its “Big Ideas 2026” roadmap that places cryptocurrencies within the plumbing of an internet where value moves as quickly as data.
The long-shot letter comes as some of the partners associated with a16z are adjusting their career paths. Foresight News reports that Ariana Simpson, general partner at a16z crypto, has “announced her resignation,” while her colleague Kofi Ampadu will also leave after the firm temporarily halted its Talent x Opportunity (TxO) program; A memo obtained by TechCrunch shows Ampadu telling employees that “the closing of my a16z chapter” came after four years of backing the founders outside of the network. These moves reflect a broader adjustment within top crypto VC firms, as funds work to rebalance seed bets, growth-stage deals, and new AI-based crypto hybrids.
Despite the migration of employees… a16z Cryptocurrencies themselves are moving forward with a new war chest. According to a report citing multiple insiders, the firm’s blockchain arm is targeting around $2 billion for its fifth cryptocurrency-dedicated fund, in addition to a broad $15 billion multi-strategy raise across infrastructure, applications and growth-stage vehicles. Since launching its inaugural $300 million cryptocurrency fund in 2018 – on the heels of Bitcoin first hitting $20,000 – a16z has grown this platform into a $4.5 billion vehicle and now supports projects from exchanges and DeFi protocols to gaming studios and NFTs.
For builders, the message is mixed but ultimately constructive: competition for a16z checks is intensifying, even as the capital pool itself grows. On the one hand, the departure of familiar faces like Simpson and Ampadu shows that even prominent cryptocurrency franchises are not immune to shifts in internal strategy; On the other hand, the $2 billion target fund and stated commitment to hold 95% of positions indicate that LPs and LPs remain in agreement on treating cryptocurrencies as a more than decade-long play. The company’s research arm continues to push for clearer token rules and widespread adoption of DeFi, arguing that “great endeavors take time” and that today’s chaotic and volatile years are the “groundwork” phase before a sharp turn in usage.
