Liquid restaking protocol Renzo announced on Tuesday that it had raised $17 million in a round of funding, CoinDesk reported. The new funding was raised in two rounds, with the first led by Galaxy Ventures and the second by Brevan Howard Digital Nova Fund. The funds will be used to expand the project's restaking services, including adding support for ERC-20 tokens. Renzo is part of a new class of "restaking" protocols built on EigenLayer, which receives Ether (ETH) deposited or "staked" by users on the Ethereum blockchain and then uses it to protect additional networks, which are called "active verification services" (AVS). As an AVS on EigenLayer, Renzo uses staked Ether (ETH) to generate income, and users receive Renzo's Liquid restaking tokens, ezETH tokens. The latest restaking trend is that users can now stake their ERC-20 tokens, which are based on the Ethereum blockchain. EigenLayer previously shared that they will begin accepting their ERC-20 token EIGEN to protect its internal AVS, EigenDA. Restaking competitor Symbiotic also shared that it will accept Ethena Labs’ $ENA and $USDe, which are ERC-20 tokens. Renzo founding contributor Lucas Kozinski said in an interview on Telegram that this is part of a broader trend, with restaking also beginning to enter the Bitcoin ecosystem and non-EVM chains.
