BrainApe, Bored Ape #9665 from the Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT Collection, serves as the mascot for BrainDAO and the IQ token. BrainApe is a part of the BrainDAO treasury's blue chip NFT holdings, which also include the Pudgy Penguin #2614 and a Hashmasks named Gnostic.^[6]

Overview

BrainApe is a pink fur Ape who is passionate about the pursuit of knowledge. He serves as the leader of BrainDAO, a DAO created and controlled by the IQ community and dedicated to bridging the real world and the metaverse and funding the future of knowledge on-chain. ^[3]

In 2022, BrainDAO decided to acquire a Bored Ape as its first acquisition in building up a valuable portfolio of blue-chip NFTs since the Bored Ape Yacht Club is Yuga Labs’ premier NFT collection and is poised to grow in value with apes forming a core part of Yuga’s Otherside metaverse. The Otherside metaverse is aligned with BrainDAO’s vision of bridging the real world and the metaverse. BrainDAO also holds the IP rights to BrainApe and all the future Blue Chip NFTs in its portfolio bringing valuable IP to the IQ ecosystem. BrainDAO acquired BAYC #9665 specifically because of its Pink fur trait which represents the brain, the center of all knowledge. BrainDAO is able to use BAYC #9665’s IP to create derivatives for IQ holders. BrainDAO will also be able to mint and claim NFTs reserved for BAYC holders.^[3]

In September 2022, BrainApe became available for licensing on feature.io, a leading web3 studio and licensing platform that has worked with Coinbase, Netflix, and more. BrainApe could earn licensing fees for BrainDAO by becoming the star of the next major film franchise, videogame, TV series, clothing brand, or advertising campaign.^[1]

“We’re incredibly excited to provide BrainDAO with the opportunity to leverage the licensing rights for their BAYC mascot, BrainApe. We are happy to support BrainDAO as we collectively build the metaverse of the future,”

said Feature CEO Steven Ilous.^[1]

BrainDAO Blue Chip NFTs Proposal

In March 2022, BrainDAO's IQ stakers voted with 685 million HiIQ votes, more than half of the total HiIQ supply at the time, in favor of the BrainDAO Blue Chip NFTs proposal. It suggested allocating funds from the BrainDAO treasury to go towards the purchase of blue chip NFTs from major NFT projects such as Bored Ape Yacht Club, CryptoPunks, Art Blocks, Cool Cats, Doodles, Azuki, Zipcy’s SuperNormal, The Sandbox, Decentraland, World of Women, Invisible Friends, Boss Beauties, Cyberkongz, and Wolf Game among others. According to the proposal, the funds would also be used to mint derivative NFTs and whitelisted NFTs related to blue chip NFT projects such as the Gucci 10KTF NFTs which were reserved for the holders of Bored Apes and several other Blue Chip NFT collections. Once the proposal passed, funds from the BrainDAO treasury were dedicated toward the purchase of blue chip NFTs, including BrainApe.^[2]

Proposal to Name the BrainDAO Ape

In May 2022, IQ stakers voted to name Bored Ape #9665, BrainApe, with their HiIQ choosing from the following options: BrainApe, BrainiesApe, BrainyApe, and High IQ Ape.^[4][5]

Staking BrainApe and ApeCoin Proposal

In December 2022, a proposal for BrainDAO to acquire 5,000 ApeCoin using its treasury funds and stake BrainApe with the Bored Ape Staking Pool passed. The passing of the proposal allows BrainDAO to stake BrainApe along with ApeCoin to start earning ApeCoin rewards. ^[7]