The CryptoPunks and Meebits NFT collections have been bought by Yuga Labs, the firm behind the Bored Ape Yacht Club.

CryptoPunks is a non-fungible token collection on the Ethereum blockchain. The project was launched in June 2017 by the Larva Labs studio, a two-person team consisting of Canadian software developers Matt Hall and John Watkinson.

The Meebits are 20,000 unique 3D voxel characters, created by a custom generative algorithm, then registered on the Ethereum blockchain.  The NFT contract the governs ownership is a standard ERC-721 that works with any compatible service or exchange.

Also included in the contract is a custom marketplace that supports like-kind trading of up to 100 Meebits per transaction, along with all the standard buy, bid and ask transactions.

The Bored Ape Yacht Club is a collection of 10000 unique Bored Ape NFTs— unique digital collectibles living on the Ethereum blockchain.

What you should know?

Yuga Labs, the business behind the Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT collection, has bought CryptoPunks and Meebits from developer Larva Labs after 24 hours of rumors and internet discussion.

On Friday evening, Yuga Labs and Larva Labs issued a joint statement on Twitter.

“We now hold the brands, copyright in the art, and other IP rights for both collections, as well as 423 CryptoPunks and 1711 Meebits,” Yuga Labs writes on their blog.

Larva Labs says it will keep the rights to Autoglyphs, its other large NFT collection, “as well as a number of our favorite Punks and Meebs.”

The most valuable NFT collection in crypto is Bored Ape Yacht Club, followed by CryptoPunks.

Yuga Labs also states that it intends to return all economic rights to the proprietors of CryptoPunk and Meebit images. Yuga Labs already owns the Bored Ape Yacht Club, but any token holder is free to monetize their own ape. Holders have taken this concept to create their own NFT collections centered on certain apes, or to sign their apes to large record companies.

In February, it was rumored that the startup was in negotiations with VC heavyweight Andreessen Horowitz about a $5 billion investment.

For clarity, Andreessen Horowitz is a private American venture capital firm, founded in 2009 by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz. The company is headquartered in Menlo Park, California. Andreessen Horowitz invests in both early-stage start-ups and established growth companies.