OpenLedger is a blockchain platform focused on strengthening artificial intelligence (AI) through verifiable data. They have successfully raised $8 million in a seed funding round. This round was led by prominent investors Polychain Capital and Borderless Capital, with additional participation from Finality Capital, Hash3, HashKey Capital, STIX, TRGC, Mask Network, MH Ventures, WAGMI Ventures, and several notable angel investors.
The funding will enable OpenLedger to tackle one of the biggest challenges in AI development: data quality. The company's platform provides a permissionless infrastructure that ensures data integrity, verifiability, and security. This infrastructure is designed to help developers create smarter and better performing AI models by utilizing verifiable data.
OpenLedger’s approach is built on three pillars: data, computing, and algorithms. While significant progress has been made in computing power and algorithm development, data quality remains a critical bottleneck. OpenLedger addresses this issue by offering a completely decentralized and verifiable data infrastructure, which is essential for the growth and development of AI.
The company has already demonstrated its expertise in the decentralization space by collaborating with well-known brands such as Sony, Walmart, Polygon, Hedera, and Flow (Dapper Labs). OpenLedger’s infrastructure leverages the economic security of EigenLayer, supported by its $20 billion total value locked (TVL) and diverse node sets.
EigenLayer Crypto Restaking
The AI market has seen rapid growth. It has seen an increase from $50 billion in 2023 to $184 billion in 2024. Some projections are estimating it will surpass $826 billion by 2030. Despite the high valuations of centralized data infrastructure companies like Scale AI find that their long-term utility is challenged by data quality issues. OpenLedger's permissionless data infrastructure aims to overcome these challenges.
"Verifiable databases were the first category I wanted to see built on EigenLayer, as this empowers a new category of developers who can work with verified data. We are excited to collaborate with OpenLedger as they grow this category!"—Sreeram Kannan, Founder of EigenLabs
OpenLedger plans to launch its testnet at the beginning of the fourth quarter of 2024. Its focus will be on expanding its team and operations to support their vision.
The bottom line
OpenLedger's successful seed funding round marks a significant step towards addressing the data quality bottleneck in AI development. By providing a decentralized and verifiable data infrastructure, OpenLedger is positioned to revolutionize the AI industry, enabling the creation of more reliable and efficient AI models. The company's innovative approach and strong backing from leading investors underscore its potential to drive substantial growth and new use cases at the intersection of Web3 and AI.
