Decentralized AI startup Pond has successfully raised $7.5 million in a seed funding round led by Archetype, with additional investments from Cyber Fund, Delphi Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, and Near Foundation. Notable angel investors include Chris Yin of Plume Network, Cynthia Wu of Matrixport, and Tesa Ho from Flashbots. Founded in 2023, Pond focuses on developing a comprehensive AI model ecosystem tailored for Web3, utilizing on-chain data to enhance crypto-specific applications. The company aims to simplify complex blockchain data through AI, facilitating better user insights and decision-making in the crypto space.

Magic Labs and Polygon have announced the launch of Newton, a cross-chain network designed to address blockchain balkanization. This initiative aims to simplify the use of cross-chain dApps, making it as seamless as "surfing the web." By partnering with Polygon, Magic Labs leverages the Ethereum layer-2 network's Chain Developer Kit and AggLayer to enable secure liquidity and user sharing across sovereign chains.

Newton represents a significant step towards unifying blockchains, akin to traditional finance systems like ACH or SWIFT. This effort is backed by leading Web3 venture capital firms, including PayPal Ventures.

Avalon Labs, a yield farming and lending protocol for Bitcoin-related tokens, has surpassed the $1 billion mark in total value locked (TVL) as Bitcoin reached a new record of $75,000. According to DeFiLlama, Avalon’s liquidity value increased by over 25% in the past week, reaching $1.1 billion. This growth is attributed to a recovery in token deposits and a significant rise in Bitcoin's price.

Avalon Labs, rebranded from Avalon Finance, launched the first CeDeFi platform in April 2024. The CeDeFi product, focusing on Bitcoin-related tokens, has seen its TVL rise to over $220 million.

Vlayer has successfully raised $10 million in a pre-seed funding round, attracting investment from a16z Crypto Startup Accelerator, Credo Ventures, and BlockTower Capital. The fundraising was executed in two tranches, with $3 million secured in February and an additional $7 million in August. Notable Web3 contributors, including members from World, Tools for Humanity, and Aztec, participated as angel investors.

The company is developing "Solid 2.0," a verifiable data infrastructure aimed at enhancing Ethereum's programming capabilities. This platform introduces functionalities such as Time Travel and Teleport, enabling historical data execution and cross-network smart contract operations. Vlayer is currently in an open alpha phase, with further developments anticipated by 2025.

Michael Cahill, founder of Douro Labs, emphasizes the resilience of the crypto industry amid political changes, drawing parallels to the 2020 U.S. election. He highlights the significant growth in real-world asset tokenization (RWA), which has surged to over $13 billion on-chain, with projections reaching $16 trillion by 2030. Cahill asserts that regulation will be pivotal in realizing this potential. Douro Labs and Pyth Data Association are developing decentralized infrastructure to provide real-time data, crucial for advancing DeFi and crypto adoption. Despite political uncertainties, Cahill remains optimistic about the sector's continued growth.

Agni Finance, a decentralized exchange on the Mantle network, has achieved a new record high in total value locked (TVL) at over $171 million as of October 31, according to DefiLlama. This marks a significant recovery from earlier declines, with TVL dropping below $90 million at the beginning of October. The recent surge is attributed to the Metamorphosis campaign, particularly the introduction of cmETH, a liquid restaking token. Launched on October 29, cmETH quickly attracted substantial deposits, now comprising 25% of Agni's TVL. Despite the growth in TVL, trading volumes remain below July's peak levels.

Me Protocol has developed a rewards platform designed to connect brands, games, and consumer-facing apps, enabling them to offer instant liquidity for their tokens. According to Wesley, this platform can transform traditional rewards programs into a more flexible, blockchain-based system.

Wesley highlighted the limitations of conventional rewards programs, such as Starbucks' Odyssey, which was restricted to Starbucks products. He believes that integrating fungible rewards could enhance the scalability and usability of such programs.

The adoption of cryptocurrencies by payment services like PayPal and Shopify has increased real-life use cases for digital assets. However, Wesley sees significant potential in blockchain-based rewards programs to further drive Web3 adoption. By allowing rewards to be universally redeemable across various brands, Me Protocol aims to simplify the user experience and promote broader acceptance of blockchain technology.

Ellipsis Labs, the developers behind the Solana-based decentralized exchange platform Phoenix, have secured a $21 million funding round. This round includes $20 million from Haun Ventures and an additional $1 million from other investors, as reported by CoinDesk.

The capital will be used to advance their verifiable finance blockchain project, Atlas. Initially built on Ethereum, Atlas now accesses both Ethereum and Solana liquidity pools. It aims to address DeFi issues such as inefficient price discovery and high transaction costs, featuring low fees and high-volume fast transaction execution.

Haun Ventures highlighted that Atlas enables high-performance financial products that can rival traditional finance without sacrificing transparency, auditability, or censorship resistance.

Glow Labs has successfully raised $30 million in a funding round led by Framework Ventures and Union Square Ventures, with contributions from Lattice Ventures, Protocol Labs, Hack VC, HF0, and Alliance DAO. The Ethereum-based decentralized physical infrastructure network (DePIN) plans to allocate $6.5 million to support its operations, while $23.5 million will be used to expand solar energy farms in India.

Glow's decentralized energy distribution network rewards solar farms with GLW tokens for electricity output and USDC for carbon credits. This funding highlights the growing investment in DePINs, with notable recent investments including Borderless Capital's $100 million fund and Daylight's $9 million Series A round led by A16z.

Glow's focus on solar energy distinguishes it from other DePIN projects like Daylight, which integrates various power products. Glow's CEO, David Vorick, emphasized the company's rapid growth and its significant impact on CO2 emissions reduction.

Axal, a Web3 startup specializing in on-chain trading tools, has launched its first product, Axal Autopilot, a verifiable autonomous agent network. This platform enables users to create personalized trading strategies, including yield maximization, portfolio rebalancing, and auto cash-outs.

The launch coincides with a $2.5 million pre-seed funding round led by CMT Digital, with contributions from a16z Crypto Startup School, Escape Velocity, and others. The funds will be used to expand Axal's team.

Axal Autopilot supports multi-chain transactions, allowing seamless buying, holding, and selling of crypto assets across different blockchains.

Franklin Templeton has become the first asset manager to launch a product on Coinbase's Base, expanding its tokenized money market fund, FOBXX, to the Ethereum layer-2 network. This move allows the fund to operate on six blockchain networks, including Avalanche, Arbitrum, Polygon, Aptos, and Stellar, with Stellar serving as the primary network for the $410 million fund.

The expansion to Base, which is part of the Optimism-based Superchain, aims to leverage the benefits of layer-2 blockchains, such as lower transaction costs and faster execution speeds. This development highlights the growing trend of financial institutions adopting on-chain technology to modernize the financial system.

Spire Labs, a Web3 startup focused on Ethereum scaling solutions, has successfully raised $7 million in a seed round co-led by Maven 11 Capital and Anagram. Other notable participants include Digital Currency Group, Bankless Ventures, Volt Capital, Finality Capital, and A16z Crypto Startup Accelerator. Angel investors such as Nick White, Jacob Arluck, and Amrit Kumar also joined the round.

The funds will be used to accelerate the development of Based Stack, a rollup framework designed to help developers deploy app-specific chains on Ethereum. According to co-founder Kaito Yanai, Based Stack differentiates itself by utilizing "based sequencing," which leverages Ethereum Layer-1 as the sequencing layer, providing benefits such as L1 composability, credible neutrality, liveness, censorship resistance, and decentralization.

Based Stack is expected to launch its testnet later this year, with a mainnet launch planned for the first quarter of 2025.

Taiko, an Ethereum-based layer 2 network launched in early 2024, has seen its total value locked (TVL) surge to a record $35 million by the end of October, according to DefiLlama data. This marks a significant increase in liquidity value, tripling in the past week alone, making Taiko the best-performing network in decentralized finance (DeFi).

The network, despite its brief existence, hosts approximately 30 decentralized applications (dapps). The recent TVL surge has been primarily driven by Panko Finance and TakoTako. Panko Finance, a decentralized exchange (DEX) launched in mid-October, saw its TVL exceed $22 million, largely due to deposits in SolvBTC and SolvBTC.BBN tokens.

Additionally, TakoTako, Taiko's largest lending app, has significantly contributed to the TVL growth. On October 30, TakoTako's TVL reached a record $6.8 million, up from less than $300,000 at the beginning of the month. The platform supports collateral deposits in ETH, USDC, USDT, and TAIKO, with ETH and USDC making up 99% of total liquidity.

Taiko's impressive growth in TVL highlights the increasing adoption and potential of layer 2 solutions in the DeFi space.

Nitro Labs has announced the successful completion of a $4 million seed round led by Lemniscap, with participation from Animoca Ventures, Borderless Capital, Finality Capital, Race Capital, and No Limit Holdings. Angel investors from Solana Foundation, Jump Crypto, and Spartan also contributed.

The funds will support the development of Termina, a scaling infrastructure designed to facilitate the deployment of layer-2 networks on the Solana blockchain. Termina aims to simplify the deployment of various decentralized applications (dApps), including gaming, trading, and decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePINs).

Currently in its private alpha devnet phase, Termina plans to launch its testnet later this year, with a mainnet and Termina token expected to go live next year. Over 20 projects are already building on the platform, encompassing both native Solana and cross-chain applications.

Nitro Labs founder Yiwen Gao emphasized that Termina's network extensions offer more than just increased transaction throughput, serving as powerful tools for experimentation and innovation.

Alien Base, a trading hub on the Base network, has experienced significant growth in its total value locked (TVL), which more than doubled in the past week. The TVL has surpassed $24 million, the highest since August 2023, according to DefiLlama.

This surge has positioned Alien Base among the top 20 largest dapps on the Base network, which now boasts a record TVL of $3.24 billion. Alien Base offers a range of trading services, including aggregated liquidity, limit orders, and yield farming.

The platform's v2 and v3 dapp versions have also seen substantial growth. TVL on v2 has reached nearly $14 million, while v3 has surged to a record $10.9 million. Key tokens on v3 include USDC, WETH, EURC, USDBC, and ALB.

On October 30, Alien Base recorded its second-highest trading volume day, processing over $5.5 million in trades. The platform's focus on stablecoins and its native token differentiates it from other Base network platforms.

Hack VC has led a $25 million funding round for Nillion, a privacy-focused blockchain project utilizing "blind computing" to ensure secure data sharing and storage on the blockchain. The fundraising also saw participation from angel investors and contributors from Web3 companies such as Arbitrum, Worldcoin, and Sei. This brings Nillion's total funding to $50 million, following a $20 million seed round in December 2022.

Nillion aims to expand its "blind computing" technology, which allows applications to process data without revealing sensitive information. The company focuses on projects at the intersection of blockchain and artificial intelligence, partnering with networks like NEAR, Aptos, and Arbitrum.

PearlFi, a decentralized trading venue for tokens and real-world assets (RWAs), has experienced significant growth this week. According to DefiLlama, its total value locked (TVL) surged from $2.4 million on October 24 to over $16 million, marking the highest level in a year.

Initially launched on Polygon, PearlFi's TVL peaked at over $82 million in October 2023 but collapsed during a migration to version 1.5. The platform has now reemerged with version 2 on re.al, an Ethereum layer 2 network for RWA tokens.

Pearl v2, launched in early 2024, focuses on stablecoins and RWAs. USDC, arcUSD, and UKRE are among the largest deposits, with the arcUSD/USDC pool leading at over $5 million in TVL. PearlFi has become the largest dapp on re.al, followed by Tangible and ICHI.

81RAVENS Secures $4.5M Seed Round for Solana-Based Shooter Game PARAVOX

81RAVENS has successfully raised $4.5 million in a funding round co-led by Digital Hearts Holdings and Gree Ventures. The funds will be directed towards accelerating the development and marketing of their first blockchain game, PARAVOX, which is set to launch on the Solana network.

PARAVOX, a 3v3 free-to-play shooter game, is currently in Global Open Alpha and has already garnered over 100,000 downloads on the Epic Games Store. Earlier this year, the game’s first major esports event, the PARAVOX Global Rapid Tournament, featured a prize pool of 100 million yen and attracted over half a million viewers.

Shimpei Yoshimura, CEO & Co-Founder of 81RAVENS, emphasized the company's goal to expand the esports market significantly by leveraging blockchain technology to connect various aspects of esports through tokens. Digital Hearts Holdings President and CEO Toshiya Tsukushi expressed confidence in 81RAVENS' potential to innovate within the gaming industry with their unique business model.

Consensys, a prominent blockchain software developer, has announced a 20% reduction in its workforce, attributing the layoffs to challenging macroeconomic conditions and regulatory uncertainty. The company has specifically criticized the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for what it describes as an "abuse of power." The SEC has accused Consensys of offering unregistered securities through its MetaMask wallet, leading to ongoing legal battles.

In a blog post, Consensys founder and CEO Joe Lubin highlighted the lack of clear regulatory frameworks as a significant obstacle for the crypto industry. He argued that this regulatory ambiguity has made it difficult for innovators and businesses to navigate the evolving space. Lubin emphasized that the SEC's actions, along with Congress's failure to address these issues, have resulted in job losses and hindered productive investment.

This development follows a series of enforcement actions by the SEC against various crypto companies, including settlements and ongoing lawsuits. The broader impact of these regulatory challenges on the industry remains to be seen.

MIRA, a decentralized exchange (DEX) on Fuel Ignition, has achieved over $6 million in total value locked (TVL) shortly after its October launch. According to DefiLlama data, the platform saw a record $6.2 million in deposits on October 19. After a brief correction, the TVL stabilized at $6.1 million.

MIRA functions as an automated market maker (AMM), hosting multiple pools for traders and liquidity providers. The platform plans to transition to a ve(3,3) model, integrating Curve’s vote escrow (ve) system with OlympusDAO’s (3,3) staking mechanism.

The most popular tokens on MIRA are Wrapped Ethereum (WETH) and USDC, each accounting for over 30% of the platform's assets, followed by ezETH and USDT, each representing over 16.5%. The largest pools by TVL are ezETH/ETH and USDC/USDT, with nearly $2.4 million and over $2.2 million, respectively.

MIRA's daily trading volume has consistently exceeded $1 million since its launch, reaching a peak of $2 million on October 23. The platform is based on Fuel Ignition, an Ethereum layer 2 network developed by Fuel Labs, which aims to enhance decentralization, speed, and accessibility. Fuel Ignition currently hosts three DeFi applications, including MIRA, with a collective TVL of $35 million.