According to incomplete statistics from CryptoDAO, there were more than 17 investment and financing events in the global crypto industry last week (October 16-October 22), with a total financing amount of approximately US$130 million, of which the number of projects that completed financing in the underlying infrastructure category accounted for nearly 40%. Through sorting and screening, CryptoDAO selected 10 representative financing projects from the numerous financing information last week and compiled them into the following table:
In addition, Crypto DAO summarized the financing trends of last week, as follows:
Institutions continue to increase their layout in the infrastructure & tool track, and both the number of financing and the total amount of financing far exceed other types of projects. Among them, the projects worth noting include Solana ecosystem multi-signature management tool Squads, encryption data company Coin Metrics, and opBNB-based AI platform MyShell.
The DeFi track has become less popular, but there have been some large financing projects. The most noteworthy ones are SynFutures, a decentralized derivatives protocol that has raised $22 million, and Elixir Protocol, which is valued at $100 million.
The popularity of blockchain games has recovered compared to last week, but overall there are no innovative game projects. Among them, Third Time Entertainment, the studio that launched the Solana-based horse racing game Photo Finish, has completed Seed+ financing.
Last week, only one NFT & Web3 Creation & Metaverse project announced financing, and only Darewise Entertainment, a subsidiary of Animoca Brands, announced the completion of financing.
In addition to the above tracks, other project types that have announced the completion of financing include cryptocurrency trading platforms, digital identity solution providers, on-chain collaborative applications, etc. Among them, it is worth noting that Fileverse, an on-chain collaborative application supported by former Coinbase CTO Balaji, has completed a $1.5 million seed round of financing, led by Gnosis Chain and Factor.
For more investment and financing details, please see below:
1. Infrastructure & Tools
Project Name: Squads Labs
Official website: https://www.sqds.io/
Attention: High
On October 17, Squads Labs, the main developer of Solana's multi-signature management tool Squads, completed a $5.7 million strategic financing led by Placeholder VC, with participation from Multicoin Capital, Solana Ventures, Jump Crypto, Solana Labs co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko, Jito Labs CEO Lucas Bruder, and Helius Labs CEO Mert Mumtaz. It is worth noting that Stepan Simkin, co-founder of Squads Labs, revealed that this was a round of financing with token warrants.
Project name: Celestia Lab
Official website: https://celestia.org/
Attention: High
On October 16, OKX Ventures announced its participation in Celestia Lab's Series B financing. It is understood that Celestia is the first modular blockchain network. Developers can use Celestia as the base layer for consensus and data functions, and then choose a virtual machine such as Ethereum, Solana, zero-knowledge aggregation, or any other compatible smart contract execution layer to build and deploy their own new blockchain. Celestia is expected to go live later this year and become the first blockchain network to use Data Availability Sampling (DAS).
Project name: Coin Metrics
Official website: https://coinmetrics.io/
Attention: High
On October 20, crypto data company Coin Metrics completed a financing of approximately $6.7 million, and the specific investors were not disclosed. It is understood that Coin Metrics mainly provides data on cryptocurrency markets, networks, and prices. Previously, Coin Metrics raised $35 million in a round of financing led by Bank of New York Mellon and Acrew Capital, and also received support from Goldman Sachs, Brevan Howard Digital, Cboe Global Market, Avon Ventures and other companies.
Project name: MyShell
Official website: https://myshell.ai/
Attention: Medium
On October 16, the opBNB-based AI platform MyShell announced that it had completed a $5.6 million seed round of financing at a valuation of $57 million. This round of financing was led by INCE Capital, with participation from Hashkey Capital, Folius Ventures, SevenX Ventures, OP Crypto, etc. It is understood that MyShell is a Web3-enabled artificial intelligence platform that allows users to create personalized chatbots called Shells. The platform is aimed at content creators and consumers - creators can generate artificial intelligence content robots, and consumers can find and use these robots. When the content robot receives attention, the creator will receive MyShell's native token.
Project name: Spheron
Official website: https://spheron.network/
Attention: Medium
On October 18, Web3 infrastructure Spheron started the second phase of its roadmap, with the main goal of solving user experience, security and reliability issues. The company revealed that it had raised $7 million in a round of financing in August 2022. Investors include Alphawave Ventures, NexusVP, Zee Prime Capital, Protocol Labs, ConsenSys Mesh, Paradigm Shift Capital, Matrix Partners India and Tykhe Ventures. Sandeep Nailwal, Aniket Jindal Julian Traversa, etc.
Project name: Ryder
Official website: https://www.ryder.id/
Attention: Medium
On October 20, hardware crypto wallet startup Ryder completed a $1.2 million financing round, with participation from Oak Grove Ventures, Bitcoin Frontier Fund, Trust Machines' Muneeb Ali, and SBX Capital. It is understood that Ryder has launched its flagship product, Ryder One, which supports the innovative TapSafe recovery function to replace mnemonics.
2. DeFi/Staking
Project Name: SynFutures
Official website: https://www.synfutures.com/
Attention: High
On October 19, the decentralized derivatives protocol SynFutures announced the completion of a $22 million financing round, led by Pantera Capital, with participation from SIG DT Investments, a subsidiary of Susquehanna International Group (SIG DTI), and HashKey Capital. SynFutures' total financing has reached $38 million. It is understood that the SynFutures platform V3 mainnet is scheduled to be released in the fourth quarter of 2023. The upgraded V3 platform incorporates the Oyster automated market maker (Oyster AMM) and is fully deployed on the chain.
Project Name: Elixir Protocol
Official website: https://elixir.finance/
Attention: High
On October 18, the DeFi protocol Elixir Protocol completed a $7.5 million Series A financing with a valuation of $100 million. This round of financing was led by Hack VC, and participated by NGC Ventures, AngelList Ventures, Bloccelerate, BODL Ventures, etc. It is understood that Elixir Protocol announced the completion of a $2.1 million seed round of financing in January this year, and FalconX, Commonwealth, OP Crypto, ChapterOne and Bitmex founder Arthur Hayes participated in this round of financing.
3. Blockchain Games
Project name: Forge
Official website: https://forge.gg/
Attention: Medium
On October 19, gaming startup Forge completed a $11 million seed round of financing, led by Makers Fund, Bitkraft Ventures, and Animoca Brands. Other participants include Hashkey Capital, Polygon Ventures, Formless Capital, and Adaverse. It is understood that Forge's current round of financing will be used to build a platform to connect and reward gamers' achievements.
Project Name: Third Time Entertainment
Official website: https://photofinish.live/
Attention: Medium
On October 21, blockchain game studio Third Time Entertainment completed a $2 million Seed+ round of financing, led by Sfermion, with participation from Reciprocal Ventures, Big Brain Holdings, 32-Bit Ventures, and 6th Man Ventures. It is understood that Third Time developed the Solana-based horse racing game Photo Finish, and this round of financing will be used to accelerate game development and promote cooperation with real-world horse racing competitions.
Project name: Upland
Official website: https://www.upland.me/
Attention: Medium
On October 20, the NFT-based digital real estate trading game Upland completed a $7 million Series A extension round of financing, led by EOS Network Ventures. This round of financing will be used to add game features to support players to purchase digital land on real-world maps. It is understood that Upland is developed based on EOS and has planned to launch tokens on Ethereum. Upland said that its total number of registered players exceeds 3 million, including about 30,000 daily active users, and has signed cooperation agreements with major sports organizations such as FIFA and the National Football League Players Association.
4. NFT & Web3 Creation & Metaverse
Project Name: Darewise Entertainment
Official website: https://www.lifebeyondstudios.com/
Attention: Medium
On October 18, Animoca Brands' subsidiary Darewise Entertainment announced that it had completed a $3.5 million private round of financing, with Gamefi Ventures, London Real Ventures, Citizen Capital, Blocore, Animoca Ventures, and Animoca Brands co-founder and executive chairman Yat Siu participating. It is understood that the Darewise ecosystem token is expected to be released on Bitcoin in early 2024, and the upcoming MMO game Life Beyond will be its first adopter.
V. Others
Project name: Beluga
Official website: https://heybeluga.com/
Attention: Medium
On October 20, Beluga, a cryptocurrency platform for new user onboarding, completed a $4 million seed round of financing. This round of financing was led by Fin Capital, with participation from Anagram, UDHC, Dispersion Capital, Aptos Labs, 2 Punks Capital, Borderless Capital, Kyber Capital, 186 Ventures, W11 Capital and Rubik Ventures. It is understood that Beluga was founded by Silicon Valley and cryptocurrency veterans from BitPay, Robinhood, Coupa Software and dYdX, and aims to provide a software tool suite that allows users to manage their cryptocurrency portfolios and use new products.
Project Name: Prove Identity
Official website: https://www.prove.com/
Attention: Medium
On October 18, digital identity solution provider Prove Identity announced the completion of a $40 million financing led by MassMutual Ventures and Capital One Ventures. It is understood that the funds from this round of financing will be used by the team to launch new business support and anti-fraud use cases and continue Prove's global expansion.
Project name: Fileverse
Official website: https://fileverse.io/
Attention: Medium
On October 17, Fileverse, an on-chain collaboration application supported by former Coinbase CTO Balaji, completed a $1.5 million seed round of financing, led by Gnosis Chain and Factor, with participation from Safe, MaskNetwork, Arweave, Waterdrip Capital, Forward Research, Galxe, etc. It is understood that Fileverse aims to build decentralized crypto-native applications to replace traditional Web2 Internet products such as Google Workspace and Notion, fundamentally solving problems such as privacy violations, intrusive advertising, and limited user ownership.
Project Name: DTCC
Official website: https://www.dtcc.com/
Attention: Medium
On October 19, the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) announced the acquisition of digital asset service provider Securrency to further expand its blockchain business. According to people familiar with the matter, DTCC acquired Securrency for approximately $50 million, but the amount has not been officially confirmed. It is understood that Securrency provides compliant tokenization and account management services, liquidity settlement, analysis and reporting to asset issuers, brokers, exchanges and banks, powering the global digital asset market.
Project name: Takadao
Official website: https://takadao.io/
Attention: Medium
On October 19, blockchain financial service provider Takadao announced the completion of a $1.6 million seed round of financing, led by Draper Associates, with other participating institutions including BIM and Core Vision Ventures. It is understood that Takadao is a blockchain-native, Sharia-compliant insurance alternative that only works with Sharia-compliant organizations. It has two flagship products: savings & lending and mutual insurance.
