Today, Nomura’s Swiss digital asset subsidiary Laser Digital announced it has invested in Webn, a business incubator focusing on web3 and institutional digital assets. Alan Howard, co-founder and former CEO of Brevan Howard, has owned more than 75% of Webn since its founding. Howard is also a major investor in Komainu, the digital asset custody company that Nomura co-founded with cryptosecurity firm Ledger and CoinShares.

Laser Digital CEO Dr. Jez Mohideen has become a non-executive director of Webn. The startup says it wants to “build a bridge between blockchain technology and institutional finance.”

“Webn’s ambition aligns with Laser Digital’s commitment to addressing the challenges currently facing institutional investors engaging with digital assets,” said Himanshu Panwar, chief executive of Webn Group UK. “With this investment, we look forward to co-building businesses with Laser Digital that fill a real market need for institutions and combine high standards of risk management and compliance with institutional-grade technology products.”

Webn is currently incubating three companies. One of them is Twinstake, an institutional-grade cryptocurrency staking provider that announced a collaboration with Komainu last week. Another is TruFin, which also provides staking strategies and crypto options.

Invariably, cryptocurrencies are staked together with other cryptocurrency investors. The challenge is that some of those investors may be dubious, which is a particular problem for institutions. Therefore, both Twinstake and TruFin require all participants to go through KYC to prevent institutions from mixing funds with undesirables.

Webn’s third company is Geometry, which helps build math and cryptography-oriented companies and protocols, such as those that implement zero-knowledge proofs.

For Laser Digital, this is at least the fifth investment this year. Last month it acquired Elysium, an established provider of post-trade solutions for over-the-counter currency markets and, more recently, digital assets.