Binance expands its incubator programs to five new cities

Binance, one of world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, announced that it is launching new incubator programs in Berlin, Buenos Aires, Lagos, Singapore, and Hong Kong in March 2019, CoinDesk reports. The incubator programs will be managed by Binance's venture arm, Binance Labs. Starting in 2019, chosen teams for the programs will receive ~$250,000 each and will be flown out to Singapore, where Binance is based, for a three-week collaboration trip and demo day. The number of teams accepted will be determined by the quality and quantity of applicants. In 2018, eight teams were selected out of over 500 applicants. 

As to why the exchange is launching incubator programs in Latin America and Africa, Ella Zhang, head of Binance Labs, told CoinDesk that “Those two emerging markets have native blockchain and crypto use cases. So we hope to find teams solving local problems like payments, the instability of local currencies, or remittance problems.”