Rise in Crypto Market Ushers In Funding Boom for Blockchain and Crypto Startups in Q1 2024
Summary:
The Q1 of 2024 sees positive trends for cryptocurrencies, exacerbated by Bitcoin ETFs launched in January. Amid these favourable market conditions, several blockchain and crypto startups have secured major funding. These startups include Utila, a wallet provider that raised $11.5M, credit intelligence platform Synnax that secured $1M, Sahara, a decentralized AI network provider that won $6M funding, TON Foundation that received $8M from Mirana Ventures, social platform, UXLINK that closed a $10M funding round, and Ethereum network, TEN, which raised $9M in a funding round led by R3.
The start of 2024 is ending on a high note for cryptocurrencies, especially due to the January advent of Bitcoin exchange-traded funds. This change in market behaviour could inspire a rise in venture capital investment after a prolonged slump. In 2023, VC firms in the crypto and blockchain domain secured $5.75 billion across 58 funds, a drop from 2022’s milestone of $37.7 billion from 262 funds, a Galaxy Digital analysis revealed. The first recovery hints emerged in 2023's last three months with $1.9 billion in venture financing, a 2.5% upsurge from before and the maiden growth in crypto enterprise investment since the dawn of 2022.
Driving investor interest is the ongoing creation of blockchain-integrated artificial intelligence solutions and products designed for institutional contributors in the crypto sphere. Here are companies that obtained funding in March’s initial weeks.
Institutional wallet provider, Utila procured $11.5 million in seed financing from NFX, Wing VC, and Framework Ventures, as well as angel contributors including Balaji Srinivasan, Charlie Songhurst, and Surojit Chatterjee. The company provides a multi-chain, self-storage wallet platform for institutional investors, which in half a year, facilitated transactions exceeding $3 billion, as per Utila. Its clientele comprises OTC desks, token issuers, brokers, hedge funds, and market makers.
Synnax garnered $1 million in pre-seed funding for a digital assets credit intelligence platform aimed at enhancing rating standards in the digital asset sector. The funding round, headed by No Limit Holdings, is allocated for developing Synnax’s platform set to facilitate the transition from typical private credit markets to blockchain technology. The Dubai-founded startup employs decentralised artificial intelligence models to counteract existing credit rating systems' deficiencies, like bias and opacity.
Sahara secured $6 million seed financing from Polychain Capital, Samsung Next, Matrix Partners, Motherson Group, among others, for creating a decentralized AI network. This network allows for the development of autonomous Knowledge Agents for analyzing proprietary data. It also offers data services for training AI models while prioritizing privacy and security.
Mirana Ventures purchased $8 million worth of Toncoin from TON Foundation. This move is part of a collaboration between Bybit, Mantle Network, and TON Foundation. Bybit has started integrating Toncoin into its services, including staking rewards and cashback. The initiative has resulted in over $22 million in trading volume, according to the TON Foundation.
Web3 social platform, UXLINK, finalized a nearly $10 million funding round from multiple investors, encompassing OKX Ventures, Web3Port Foundation, and others. Unlike traditional platforms that focus on one-way interactions, UXLINK prioritizes two-way, friendship-like interactions, offering features like a social decentralized exchange for digital assets trading and a reward system for user participation and contribution.
The Ethereum layer 2 network, TEN, developed by Obscuro Labs, secured $9 million in funding, led by banking consortium R3. The team is working on customizable smart contract privacy levels that would allow developers to decide the parts to make private and public. With features such as programmable encryption, immediate bridges, and random number generation, TEN is set to be launched on the mainnet in October.
Published At
3/17/2024 9:14:04 PM
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