SMI Vantage signs MOU to develop NFT publishing business

MAINBOARD-LISTED SMI Vantage Y45 on Wednesday (Nov 17) said it is planning to develop a non-fungible token (NFT) publishing business to tap the growing interest in crypto assets.

The company noted that sales of NFTs - unique digital assets that can be traded online, often using cryptocurrency - surged to US$10.7 billion in the third quarter of 2021. Market tracker DappRadar noted that this was a more than eightfold increase from the previous quarter.

In a bourse filing on Nov 17, SMI Vantage said it has signed a memorandum of understanding with Nasdaq-listed substantial shareholder The9 Limited to explore developing the NFT publishing business. It added that it expects to conclude finalisation of the plans "within the next few weeks".

Mark Bedingham, president and chief executive of SMI Vantage, said: "SMI will aim to enable a wider range of contributors to create, mint and trade their digital content on NFT platforms."

The company said that it intends to seek digital content for publication and sale across several NFT platforms. Contributors will submit their digital assets to SMI Vantage, which will then serve as publisher and sign agreements with selected contributors to handle the auctioning and trading of the completed work on NFT platforms.

Shares of SMI Vantage closed 0.1 Singapore cent or 1.6 per cent higher at 6.5 cents on Nov 17, before the announcement.