Over 100 Crypto Companies Raised Hundreds of Millions of Dollars in Investments in August. Which Projects Got the Most Funding

In August 2024, 110 projects received $785 million in funding from foundations and private investors, down 22% from the previous month ($1.01 billion in July 2024) and up 20% from a year earlier ($660 million in August 2023), according to Chinese journalist Colin Wu.

Among all the projects that received funding in August, most are in the field of decentralized finance (DeFi), gaming projects (GameFi) and artificial intelligence (AI). Some startups are developing their own first- and second-level blockchains. In addition, projects from such categories as real-world asset tokenization (RWA) and distributed physical infrastructures (DePIN) received investments.

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Top 10 Largest Projects by Amount of Funds Raised

Mining company Bitfarms announced the acquisition of its competitor, Stronghold. Bitfarms bought the company's shares at a premium of 71% to their average 90-day price on NASDAQ. Thus, Stronghold received $175 million.

The startup PIP Labs, the developer of the blockchain project Story Protocol, closed an $80 million investment round, which was led by a16z crypto, the crypto fund of Andreessen Horowitz. Polychain Capital also participated in the financing. The project is developing a blockchain solution for confirming intellectual property rights.

Bridge is a global network for stablecoin payments from former top managers of the Coinbase exchange and the Square payment company. In August, the startup held several investment rounds totaling $58 million with the participation of Sequoia Capital, Ribbit Capital, and Index Ventures. The project's clients include SpaceX and Coinbase.

The Chaos Labs project, which provides automated risk management solutions for DeFi projects, closed a $55 million investment round led by Haun Ventures. PayPal's venture division and Galaxy Digital also participated in the financing. The project's solutions are used by the Aave, GMX, and Jupiter platforms.

Morpho, a decentralized lending protocol, announced the completion of a $50 million strategic funding round led by Ribbit Capital, with participation from a16z crypto, Coinbase Ventures, Variant, Pantera, and Brevan Howard. The project plans to integrate DeFi into the internet’s base protocol layer to expand lending use cases.

Sahara AI, a decentralized AI-powered blockchain platform, announced the completion of a $43 million funding round led by Binance Labs, Pantera Capital, and Polychain Capital. Samsung and DAO5 participated in the round. Sahara AI was founded by Tyler Zhou, an AI professor at the University of Southern California and former chief investment officer of Binance Labs. The project is focused on ensuring security, fairness, and inclusivity for all users, with a focus on the independence and capabilities of AI.

Fabric Cryptography has raised $33 million in a Series A funding round led by Blockchain Capital and 1kx, with participation from Offchain Labs, Polygon, and Matter Labs. Fabric is based on a special-purpose processor device that is designed to handle cryptocurrencies. The funding will be used to develop chips, software, and algorithms.

WSPN, a stablecoin infrastructure company, announced the completion of a $30 million seed funding round led by Foresight Ventures and Folius Ventures, with participation from Hash Global. The project aims to increase the availability of crypto assets in payment solutions.

Edge Matrix Chain has closed a $20 million funding round led by Polygon Ventures and Amber Group. The round included participation from One Comma, Kapley Judge and Associated Corporations, and Cyberrock Venture Fund. The startup plans to use the funds to launch its own AI-focused blockchain. The project also aims to expand and support the computing power of graphics processing units (GPUs) and introduce a new asset class to DeFi.

Space and Time announced the completion of a $20 million Series A funding round led by Framework Ventures, Lightspeed Faction, Arrington Capital, and Hivemind Capital. Microsoft's M12 Ventures fund participated in the round. The startup reportedly raised $20 million in September 2022, led by M12 Ventures. Space and Time plans to bring the security of blockchain to AI applications.