With the new year approaching, Foresight News will wrap up 2024 and look forward to 2025 in the last week of 2024 with a year-end must-read series. Witness the past to know the future.
Written by: aididiaojp.eth, Foresight News
According to Foresight Wiki statistics, a total of 979 financing transactions in the crypto industry were recorded throughout 2024, including 354 in tools and infrastructure, 196 in the DeFi sector, 112 in asset management, and 137 in chain games and NFTs, with a total disclosed financing amount of approximately 11.583 billion dollars. The total disclosed financing amount remained the same as last year, while the number of financing transactions in the DeFi sector saw a significant increase of 37% year-on-year.
In 2024, there were a total of 17 financing rounds exceeding 100 million, of which 6 were in the AI track. The ten projects worthy of attention are as follows:
Elon Musk's AI startup xAI has raised $5 billion, achieving a valuation of $45 billion.
Mixed reality startup Magic Leap recently received a $590 million investment from the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, as Magic Leap is entering the metaverse market.
The 'Network Nation' project Praxis announced the completion of $525 million in financing, with participation from GEM Digital and others. Praxis claims to be the world's first network nation, an internet-native alliance aimed at accelerating technological progress and revitalizing Western civilization. Over 14,000 Praxians reside in 82 countries/regions.
Monad Labs completed $225 million in financing, led by Paradigm. Monad Labs aims to introduce parallel execution and superscalar pipeline technology through its parallel EVM Layer1 project Monad to enhance the performance of the Ethereum Virtual Machine and address the low throughput issues of existing EVM-compatible blockchains.
Bitcoin infrastructure development company Blockstream announced the completion of $210 million in convertible note financing, led by Fulgur Ventures. Blockstream will accelerate the adoption and development of the company's Layer 2 technology, grow its mining business, and expand its Bitcoin capital reserves.
Decentralized social protocol Farcaster completed $150 million in financing, led by Paradigm. Farcaster will mainly focus on daily active user growth and adding developer primitives such as channels and direct messaging to the protocol.
Crypto investment platform Public completed $135 million in equity and debt financing, led by Accel. Public will enhance the AI capabilities of the Public platform.
Digital asset management company ParaFi Capital completed $120 million in financing, with participation from Theta Capital Management and others. ParaFi Capital plans to acquire stakes in other crypto funds focused on specific market segments, strategies, or regions, with plans to build a portfolio investing in 30 to 50 such funds over the next 3 to 5 years.
Layer1 public chain Berachain completed $100 million in Series B financing, led by Framework Ventures and others. Berachain claims that its currently available blockchain test version has processed 100 million transactions, and the platform aims to be compatible with applications based on the Ethereum blockchain.
HashKey Group announced the completion of nearly $100 million in Series A financing at a valuation exceeding $1.2 billion. HashKey Group will deepen its full ecological layout in the virtual asset industry, accelerate the diversification of licensed business products in Hong Kong, and promote the Group's compliance and innovative development on a global scale.
There were a total of 100 financing rounds exceeding ten million, of which 22 disclosed financing amounts of 50 million dollars and above, with ten noteworthy projects as follows:
The core contributor team of the on-chain IP protocol Story, PIP Labs, announced the completion of an $80 million Series B financing, led by a16z Crypto.
The Bitcoin staking protocol Babylon completed a $70 million financing, led by Paradigm.
Modular blockchain Eclipse completed a $50 million Series A financing, led by Placeholder and Hack VC. Eclipse has launched its mainnet, and has released the development and testnet versions of its protocol, with multiple DApps already testing its infrastructure.
DeFi lending protocol Morpho completed a $50 million strategic round of financing, led by Ribbit Capital.
Cryptography company Zama completed a $73 million Series A financing, led by Multicoin Capital and Protocol Labs. Zama will continue to research and develop its FHE tools.
Crypto market maker Flowdesk completed a $50 million Series B financing, with participation from Cathay Innovation, Ripple, Bpifrance, etc. This round of financing has pushed Flowdesk's valuation over $250 million. Flowdesk plans to use this financing round to further expand its global business, focusing on expansion in Singapore and the United States, and to establish a new office in London.
Quora CEO Adam D'Angelo announced the completion of a $75 million financing, led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). The funds from this financing round will mainly be used to accelerate the development of its AI chat platform Poe, with most of the funds expected to be paid to the creators of Bots on the platform through its creator monetization program.
US fintech company Figure Technologies completed a $60 million Series A financing, and Figure announced the establishment of an independent company called Figure Markets, which will develop a platform for investors to trade various blockchain-native assets, including cryptocurrencies, stocks, and alternative investments, with the new trading platform utilizing the Provenance blockchain.
Cross-border payment and settlement blockchain company Partior completed $80 million in Series B financing, with participation from Deutsche Bank.
ZK proof startup Succinct Labs completed a new round of financing of $55 million, led by Paradigm.
In terms of institutions, ranked by the number of disclosed investments in 2024, the top ten institutions are OKX Ventures, Animoca Brands, Polychain Capital, Foresight Ventures, a16z, Big Brain Holdings, Robot Ventures, HashKey Capital, Hack VC, Spartan Group, Bankless Ventures, GSR Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, CMS Holdings, and SevenX Ventures, with specific investment numbers and amounts as follows:
OKX Ventures made a total of 50 investments, of which 10 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely Portal, ether.fi, Taiko, Myshell, CARV, Movement Labs, Cysic, Goplus Security, Solv Protocol, and Mocaverse.
Animoca Brands made a total of 48 investments, of which 15 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely io.net, Polyhedra Network, peaq, XION, Monad, Puffer Finance, Shiba Inu, Lava, Humanity, Goplus Security, Bondex, Redacted Cartel, Balance, Mawari Network, Gelato, and Sapien.
Polychain Capital made a total of 37 investments, of which 17 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely Aitlayer, Monkey Tilt, Eclipse, Polyhedra, dappOS, Berachain, Movement Labs, Botanix Labs, Babylon, ORA, Pi Squared, Lombard, Sahara AI, Story Protocol, Yellow Card, Bitfinity, and Hyperbolic.
Foresight Ventures made a total of 36 investments, of which 17 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely Overworld, ether.fi, io.net, Morph, Myshell, Gomble Games, IoTeX, Avalon, Movement Labs, Avail, Fhenix, Sentient, Lombard, Sahara AI, Pin AI, Noble, and Lens Protocol.
a16z made a total of 35 investments, of which 18 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely Ouora, Doppel, Espresso Systems, MyPriz, Kiosk, Farcaster, xAI, Neynar, Tapi, Morpho, Story Protocol, SSI, Balance, Pin AI, Exowatt, Azra Games, Opacity Network, and Vlayer.
Big Brain Holdings made a total of 34 investments, of which 11 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely Overworld, Utila, Parallel, Gomble Games, Monad, Shiba Inu, Sonic, MegaETH, Essential, Solayer, and Hemi Labs.
Robot Ventures made a total of 34 investments, of which 11 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely Backpack, Succinct Labs, Alpen Labs, Movement Labs, Nuffle Labs, Conduit, MegaETH, Sentient, Pi Squared, Celestia, and Delta.
HashKey Capital made a total of 33 investments, of which 13 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely Overworld, Polyhedra Network, mystiko, Seeds Labs, Cysic, Avail, Goplus Security, Particle Network, ORA, Sentient, Huma Finance, Mento, and Nillion.
Hack VC made a total of 32 investments, of which 16 projects had financing of over ten million dollars, namely Aitlayer, Monkey Tilt, io.net, Eclipse, Mezo, Berachain, Movement Labs, Fhenix, Sentient, Solayer, Pin AI, Variational, Gelato, Nillion, Exabits, and Spicenet.
Spartan Group has made a total of 30 investments, of which 10 are projects with financing of over ten million dollars, namely Overworld, MetaCene, Morph, Peaq, Parallel, Centrifuge, Particle Network, Redacted Cartel, RedStone, and Essential.
Regarding crypto funds, a total of 23 crypto funds were announced in 2024, including:
Uncorrelated Ventures raised $315 million for a new fund, 20% of which will be used to support crypto startups.
LayerZero, in collaboration with a16z and others, launched the lzCatalyst program, incentivizing participating funds to invest $300 million in LayerZero integrated projects.
Crypto venture capital Hack VC raised $150 million for a new fund, with about one-third deployed.
Immutable, King River Capital, and Polygon Labs plan to raise $100 million for a new Web3 gaming fund.
Web3Port established a $100 million fund, Web3Port Foundation.
Bonfire Union, the venture capital arm of Mask Network, will launch its second fund, currently raising a total of $100 million.
CMT Digital is raising $150 million for its fourth fund.
Tiger Global's new venture capital fund raised $2.2 billion, marking the smallest fundraising amount in nearly a decade.
Hypersphere launched a $130 million liquidity fund, Atlas, and plans to raise an additional $75 million.
Borderless Capital launched a $100 million DePIN fund.
Former CoinShares Chief Strategy Officer founded Crucible Capital, planning to launch two new funds totaling $75 million.
Solana Accelerator Colosseum raised $60 million and has invested in 11 projects.
Cryptomeria Capital plans to launch a $50 million Web3 venture capital fund.
Pantera Capital completed a $20 million financing, planning to double its support for the TON blockchain ecosystem.
VanEck launched a $30 million venture capital fund to support crypto and AI.
Morph and Foresight Ventures jointly launched a $20 million ecological fund.
Foresight Ventures, MEXC Ventures, and Mirana Ventures set up a fund for the expansion of the Aptos ecosystem.
Frictionless Capital has raised $20 million to invest in the blockchain sector.
Figment Capital completed a strategic round of financing.
CDP Venture Capital launched an accelerator program called Frontech Accelerator with a scale of €7 million.
Crypto venture capital Contango raised $5 million to invest in startups at the intersection of AI and blockchain.
Venture capital firm AgileGTM established a $10 million B2B blockchain accelerator fund.
Asymmetry plans to raise $21 million for a new fund, focusing on the blockchain sector.
Recommended reading:
Overview of the 2024 Memecoin Super Cycle
2025 Airdrop Treasure List | These 30+ projects are worth attention
2024 Crypto annual keywords: Airdrop, Meme, AI ...
The top ten crypto moments of 2024: Trump elected, spot ETF approved, Bitcoin breaks through $100,000 for the first time
