Worldcoin, the digital identity project co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, has secured $135 million through a direct sale of its WLD token. The announcement on May 21 triggered a 25% surge in the token’s price, reaching $1.55—a three-month high—within 24 hours.
The funding will accelerate the rollout of Worldcoin’s iris-scanning Orb devices across the United States. The company plans to deploy 7,500 Orbs nationwide by the end of the year, aiming to provide biometric verification to over 180 million Americans. Current deployments are active in cities including Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, and San Francisco.
The token sale was conducted by World Assets Ltd., a subsidiary of the Worldcoin Foundation. Major investors Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Bain Capital Crypto purchased WLD tokens at market price, without discounts or lock-up periods. This transaction added over 100 million tokens to the circulating supply and was not structured as a traditional venture round.
Worldcoin’s system uses iris scans to create a proof-of-personhood digital identity, offering users WLD tokens in exchange for biometric verification. These tokens can be used within Worldcoin’s app ecosystem for services such as token-backed loans and prediction markets. The project currently has over 26 million users, with 12.5 million having completed Orb-based verification.
Despite rapid expansion, Worldcoin faces regulatory challenges in countries like Spain, Indonesia, Kenya, Germany, and Brazil over data privacy and biometric compliance concerns. The company maintains that iris scans are anonymized and deleted after verification.
Early backers’ continued investment at current market prices—after a 90% token price drop over 14 months—signals strong confidence in Worldcoin’s long-term vision. The raised capital will also support the creation of a manufacturing facility in Texas to scale Orb production and distribution.
