Crypto Funding: Yes, There is Still Crypto Funding

A busy week in crypto funding wraps up with 17 startups securing over $254 million in funding from venture capitalists. Hopefully very few of them parked their fresh cash in Silicon Valley Bank.

Most companies raising capital were in the early stages of their startup journey, with many focused on building in DeFi, NFT and blockchain gaming. 

The trend isn’t surprising, considering as one CoinGecko’s latest reports shows how in 2022 DeFi companies have seen a 190% growth in funding — and CeFi saw a 73% dip.

Here are some of highlights:

Proven

Cryptography company Proven secured $15.8 million in a seed round led by Framework Ventures. Angel investors including Balaji Srinivasan, Roger Chen and Ada Yeo also participated.

Proven uses zero-knowledge technology proofs to enable exchanges, stablecoin issuers and asset managers to reveal assets and liabilities without needing to publicly show sensitive information.

Proven is planning to use the funding to grow its development team and technological infrastructure. 

Roy Learner, a partner at Framework Ventures said in a statement that “the long-term survival of crypto is highly dependent on establishing trust between customers and the platforms holding their assets. Understandably, we are seeing these platforms looking far and wide for a solution that best protects themselves and their customers.”

Believer

Blockchain gaming company Believer has landed a noteworthy $55 million in a Series A led by Lightspeed Venture Partners. 

Andreessen Horowitz (a16z),  Bitkraft Ventures, Riot Games, 1Up Ventures and others, also participated.

The Los Angeles-based startup will use this funding to expand its developer teams. 

“The last few years have brought forward some very exciting technologies. In our world, where the player is the focus, our goal is to bring select technologies into the development and gameplay spaces explicitly for the betterment of our players and the games they love,” Steven Snow, Believer’s chief product officer, said in a statement.

Kresus

Kresus, a Web3 mobile app, and landed $25 million in its latest Series A led by LC Ventures. 

Other participating investors include JetBlue Ventures, Craft Ventures and Franklin Templeton.

The startup is founded by serial entrepreneur and former diplomat Trevor Traina. He was formerly nominated by Donald Trump to be the US ambassador to Austria between March 2018 and January 2021.

The company has already hired 100 employees and is looking to launch its app later in the year. User experience will be a focus for the application, as it hopes to make its mark in the cryptocurrency space.

Other notable funding this week:

• Toku, a token-based payroll solution, landed $20 million from Blockchain Capital. Protocol Labs, GMJP, OrangeDAO and others also participated.
• Yuga Labs secured $16.5 million after its TwelveFold auction through bitcoin ordinals.
• Cubist, a web3 development tool, has received $7 million in a seed round led by Polychain Capital.