Avantis raises THB100 million to launch Thailand’s first ‘SANGA’ digital asset tokenization platform that provides property & lifestyle investment opportunities

The initiative to launch the virtual land deals is set to get off the ground in Japan and the United Kingdom in response to digital lifestyles of next-generation investors who are looking for long-term returns on promising investment. The digital real estate investing platform “SANGA” touts as the first of its kind decentralized and integrated blockchain-based platform that features lifestyle content and investment stuff.

Mr. Niran Pravithana, Group CEO at AVA Advisory and Avantis laboratory, said AVA Advisory is a subsidiary of the AVA Group that has been established to provide blockchain-based investment advisory services. AVA Advisory is a joint venture between Jaymart’s J Ventures Company Limited and Rende Development Company Limited. The two companies teamed up to raise around 100 million baht to establish “Avantis” company for developing the SANGA platform to optimize development of blockchain-based property businesses, aiming to transform the real-world land title deeds into virtual lands or non-fungible token (NFT)-related digital land assets. It focuses on tokenizing or converting a real-world overseas property into a digital reality or digital token before selling it to interested investors. Property and real estate categories that will be traded during the initial stage include residential property located mainly in Japan and the United Kingdom.

At present, global property investment is on an upward trend as the property industry is seeing its growth trajectory, especially in Japan and the United Kingdom. Meanwhile, the crypto market has also gained traction over the years. The SANGA is an integrated platform that highlights property investment opportunities and digital advantage of cryptocurrencies to make a difference in the global property trading by developing real-world asset-backed tokens for digital land title deeds, helping to boost investor confidence in the tokenized digital reality. The advantages and benefits of having a digital title deed or virtual NFT land is that it provides an easy access to the global market, improved efficiency, easy tracking of assets and it also promotes transparency.

Meanwhile, prices and returns on investment in the real-world asset-backed property tokens are fundamentally based on prices of asset classes in the real world. SANGA does not utilize the blockchain technology to tokenize real-world assets in order to drive up the prices in the market, but the objective of the tokenization of real-world assets is to benefit the industry such as helping to reduce operating costs or simplifying land ownership transfers, using digital land as a collateral assets and mortgage applications. Investors, traders, owners and buyers do not have to bring along any physical land title deed to complete a transaction in order to avoid unnecessarily increasing expenses. The adoption of real-world asset tokenization efficiently helps save costs and time. The rising momentum of tokenized real estate investing has led to many countries and territories imposing new regulatory measures, rules and regulations and legislations to govern digital real estate investments and shape the future of investing in real-word asset-backed tokens. Hong Kong came up with crypto asset regulations to regulate investments in asset-back tokens with new rules on blockchain-based securities expected to be introduced by mid-2023. Many countries across the world have demonstrated that the blockchain technology is not only just for cryptocurrency, but it also plays a key role in developing other blockchain-based technologies and innovations to maximize efficiency in transactions across asset classes in the real world.

The goal of purchasing a property and real estate investing is to have an investment property and also to fulfill a chosen lifestyle of a buyer. There are different property investment purposes. Some buyers bought a favorite property for their own living and some buyers bought it as an investment property for an increasing value and returns in the future. The SANGA platform is developed to primarily respond to chosen lifestyles of each individual investor. The fundamental development concept of the SANGA platform is that investors and buyers will not only get a range of potential properties and assets located in prime locations that were selected by a professional team of SANGA experts, prospective investors and buyers are also entitled to a rights to stay in any residential property under SANGA’s property portfolio. For instance, a buyer who bought a residential unit in Tokyo, Japan, is basically allowed to stay at the residential unit purchased. If the buyer travels to other provinces or countries like Osaka, Hokkaido and London where there are residential properties under SANGA’s property portfolio, the buyer can notify the SANGA platform regarding the rights to stay at a preferred residential unit in a particular province or country the buyer is traveling to. The SANGA is not only a platform that perfectly responds to an investment purpose, but also a lifestyle product that simplifies your life when traveling or even living abroad.

The seed fund of around 100 million baht will be used to draft guidelines and rules governing investments in tokenized real-world assets as well as developing a digital land title management platform. Since the company focuses on managing tokenized digital land and assets in foreign countries, SPV company has been established as a holding firm registered in the United Arab Emirates in Dubai to look after all digital assets and tokenized land contracts. All virtual lands and real deals will be tokenized to become digital assets before being kept under the world-class storage and security standards. A business entity in Japan will be set up to supervise all residential properties under portfolio. More professional individuals will be employed to develop blockchain-based smart contracts for the highest security in digital land title and tokenized asset protection. All 100 million baht in seed fund will also be used for ecosystem and structural development and expanding the management team.

Mr. Thanawat Lertwattanarak, Chief Executive Officer of J Ventures Company Limited (JVC), said the SANGA platform will simplify direct investments in properties located in foreign countries through the blockchain-based tokenization. It is a commitment to accelerating digital transformation of Jaymart Group. Moreover, J Ventures is confident in capabilities and professional management of SANGA executives who have an expertise in the financial market. They are expected to bring success to the SANGA platform.

Mr. Pidok Sooksawas, Deputy Chief Investment Officer, Rende Development Company Limited, said Rende Development is committed to digitalizing its hospitality business as digital technology platform becomes one of the global megatrends that shape the future of business development. The joint capital investment presents a great opportunity for the company to find a new S curve for further development.

Regarding the details of Avantis’ phased business development, property and real estate tokenization is scheduled to commence in the first phase. All real-world assets will be tokenized into digital assets via the SANGA platform in order to reduce costs associated with transactions and ownership transfers. It not only provides greater convenience for investors to invest in overseas property, investors can also enjoy a host of lifestyle benefits as they can stay at their purchased residential units when traveling and living abroad. SANGA expects the valuation of its residential property portfolio to hit 10 billion baht over the first two years of operations with a focus on tokenizing real-world assets in Japan at 70% and the United Kingdom at around 30% of portfolio. SANGA is also looking forward to expanding its property portfolio in other countries in the future. For the second phase, SANGA plans to advance into the digital banking business in order to complement and optimize digital asset business development. The digital banking business is expected to start operations over the next 1-2 years and the company will mainly pivot all business activity and resources to the global market.