Funding Roundup: Some $300 Million Poured into Crypto Projects Last Week

Only companies that add value will survive the bear market

article-image

Blockworks exclusive art by Axel Rangel

share

key takeaways

  • Ex-meta employees and founders of Aptos Labs secure $150 million in funding
  • Halborn raises its first venture capital round, securing $90 million to power through the bear market

Over $300 million of funding was poured into crypto companies this past week.

Ex-Meta Platforms staff raised $150 million in funding for Aptos Labs, a blockchain startup that wants to make transactions faster and cheaper. The Palo Alto based company was founded by Mo Shaikh and Avery Chin, former Meta employees who worked on cryptocurrency project Diem, which fell apart earlier this year due to regulatory difficulties. 

The startup had already reached unicorn status in March, and this new funding is speculated to almost double its valuation. 

Blockchain security company Halborn also raised significant capital for its Series A led by Summit Partners. 

“We are fully bootstrapped and raised $0 until this Series A,” Rob Behnke, co-founder of Halborn told Blockworks. 

The $90 million that the company has received will be used to “launching multiple blockchain security automation products for the world of Web3 builders,” Behnke said. Adding that despite bear market conditions, “we’re also planning on hiring another 100 people over the next 12 months.”

“There have been a number of challenging crypto headlines in the market of late. In our view, this will result in a necessary separation of the “good ideas” from the “bad”,” Matt Hamilton, a managing director at Summit Partners, told Blockworks. 

“We believe companies that add value for their customers will get rewarded and survive; those that are adding no value or engaging in pure speculation probably will not,” Hamilton said.

Halborn was not the only company to have raised a successful Series A. Decentralized crypto exchange Hashflow also announced that it had successfully secured $25 million from multiple venture capitalists including Jump Crypto, Wintermute and GSR, bringing its valuation to $400 million.

This new capital will allow Hashflow to “aggressively onboard new market makers to maximize the liquidity on our platform for our users,” Varun Kumar, the CEO said.

Other notable raises this week include:

  • Developer of an AI engine for NFT content recognition, Optic — raised an $11 million seed round last week. Co-founder Andrey Doronichev told Blockworks that “we want to become a public infrastructure for all the companies out there…we’re building a layer of infrastructure that watches every token come into every chain.”
  • Meow, a crypto yield offering startup, closed a $22 million Series A led by Tiger Global.
  • Game-to-earn company Fitchin raised a $3.5M seed round and onboards Joe McCann, founder of crypto fund, Asymmetric as an official advisor.

Don’t miss the next big story – join our free daily newsletter.

Tags

Upcoming Events

WED - FRI, OCTOBER 9 - 11, 2024

Pack your bags, anon — we’re heading west! Join us in the beautiful Salt Lake City for the third installment of Permissionless. Come for the alpha, stay for the fresh air. Permissionless III promises unforgettable panels, killer networking opportunities, and mountains […]

MON - WED, MARCH 18 - 20, 2024

Crypto’s premier institutional conference returns to London in March 2024. The DAS: London Experience:  Attend expert-led panel discussions and fireside chats  Hear the latest developments regarding the crypto and digital asset regulatory environment directly from policymakers and experts   Grow your network […]

recent research

Pyth Cover.jpg

Research

Pyth is a low latency pull-based oracle. In a future that looks increasingly high frequency, with various alt L1s and L2s that have significantly shorter block times than Ethereum, and an explosion of “high-frequency” protocols such as oracle or CLOB perp DEXs, Pyth’s low latency oracle product looks much better positioned to capture a significant amount of market share in comparison to competitors.

article-image

Can an ERC-20 token fix science? Coinbase’s Brian Armstrong hopes so

article-image

Roughly $65 billion worth of assets remain on Binance after the exchange agreed to pay, forfeit $4.3 billion Tuesday, Nansen data shows

article-image

The HTX exchange has been hit by a security breach, similar to the recent Poloniex hack

article-image

We have the answers for the usual barrage of questions stuffed with preconceived judgments about Web3, crypto and blockchain

article-image

NFT data will be integrated into CoinGecko APIs in second quarter of 2024, having bought Zash for an undisclosed sum

article-image

Binance and its former CEO have pleaded guilty to federal charges of over $4.3 billion