Helius Medical Technologies just made a big move in the crypto world by raising $500 million in a private funding round, with the goal of building a massive Solana (SOL) treasury. This round was led by Pantera Capital, a well-known investment firm in the blockchain space. On top of that, there’s another $750 million in attached warrants, which could boost the total investment to $1.25 billion.

Summer Capital, one of Asia’s early crypto fund managers, also joined the funding. Other major investors include Big Brain Holdings, Animoca Brands, FalconX, Republic Digital, and several others—showing strong confidence in Helius and Solana.

The company plans to build a large treasury of SOL tokens and use them to earn passive income through staking and participate in decentralized finance (DeFi) opportunities within the Solana ecosystem. This strategy is being led by Joseph Chee, the Executive Chairman of Helius and founder of Summer Capital, along with support from Cosmo Jiang and Dan Morehead from Pantera Capital.

Helius executives pointed out that Solana is currently one of the fastest-growing blockchains. It handles over 3,500 transactions per second and brings in high transaction revenue. Unlike Bitcoin, which doesn’t earn interest, SOL offers about a 7% annual staking yield. This makes it attractive for long-term investment and income generation.

After the announcement, Helius stock (HSDT) soared by more than 159%, jumping from $7.91 to $45.51 before settling around $19.63. This mirrors what has happened with other companies that announced large crypto treasury moves. For example, BitMine’s stock skyrocketed over 500% when it revealed its crypto strategy.

It looks like we’re entering what many are calling “Solana season.” Similar to how Ethereum once attracted companies to build ETH treasuries, Solana is now drawing big players looking to invest heavily in SOL. Companies like Upexi, DeFi Development Corp., and Sol Strategies are already putting hundreds of millions into Solana.

Upexi Inc., originally a consumer goods company, now holds over 2 million SOL tokens worth around $447 million. They’re earning around $105,000 daily from staking rewards alone and have added former BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes to their advisory board.

Recent data from CoinGecko shows that at least eight companies have created Solana treasuries, holding over $1.5 billion in SOL—more than 1% of the total supply. Forward Industries, one of these new players, recently bought 6.82 million SOL for about $1.58 billion.

According to Mert Mumtaz, CEO of Helius, Solana treasury-focused companies have raised between $3 billion and $4 billion so far. And unlike traditional treasury strategies like MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin approach, most of this capital will be actively used in Solana’s DeFi ecosystem. This could drive even more growth and value for SOL.

Currently, Solana trades at around $233.82 and has over $13 billion locked in DeFi projects—second only to Ethereum. Analysts remain optimistic: VanEck sees SOL hitting $520 by year-end, and China’s DeepSeek AI believes it could reach $1,000 by late 2026.

With increasing institutional interest and growing use cases in DeFi, Solana is quickly becoming a top choice for crypto-focused treasury investments.