Funding Weekly: 22 deals raised approximately $138 million, GameFi and infrastructure remain popular
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Funding Weekly: 22 deals raised approximately $138 million, GameFi and infrastructure remain popular
Between February 12 and February 18, seven blockchain projects raised over $5 million each.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsWritten by: TechFlow
According to RootData, 22 blockchain startups raised a total of $137.9 million between February 12 and February 18.
Projects that raised over $5 million include:
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On-chain debt and credit system Concrete Protocol announced a $7.5 million funding round;
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Modular blockchain developer Lava Network completed a $15 million seed round;
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NFT-backed lending platform MetaStreet announced a $25 million funding round;
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Web3 gaming developer Overworld completed a $10 million seed round;
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Architect, the crypto startup founded by former FTX US President Brett Harrison, completed a $12 million funding round;
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MPC wallet company Fordefi announced a $10 million funding round;
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Cross-chain interoperability protocol Analog announced a $16 million raise at a $120 million valuation.
Featured Projects
Ethena Labs
Overview: Ethena is building derivatives infrastructure that transforms Ethereum into a global internet bond via delta-neutral positions on stETH, aiming to create the first crypto-native, yield-bearing stablecoin: USDe.
Investors: Stablecoin developer Ethena Labs raised $14 million. Dragonfly and Maelstrom—the family office of BitMEX founder Arthur Hayes—co-led the round.
Highlights:
1. Ethena Labs was selected for Binance Labs’ sixth incubation season;
2. Seraphim, former DeFi Growth Lead at Lido, has joined Ethena Labs as Growth Lead;
3. Ethena Labs has two main products: 1. USDe: A stablecoin users can mint using USD, ETH, or liquid staking tokens as collateral. 2. Internet Bond: A USD-denominated savings instrument that accumulates value by capturing inherent staking yields and futures market basis from sUSDe.
Ultiverse
Overview: Ultiverse is a social gaming metaverse connecting Web3 with immersive, fully VR-compatible AAA virtual worlds. By enabling players of varying economic capacity to build mutually beneficial relationships, Ultiverse aims to create a pioneering MetaFi ecosystem.
Investors: AI-powered all-in-one Web3 gaming platform Ultiverse completed a $4 million strategic round led by IDG Capital, with participation from Animoca Brands, Polygon Ventures, MorningStar Ventures, Taiko, ZetaChain, Manta Network, DWF Ventures, and Jacob KO (Partner at Superscrypt), among others.
Highlights:
1. Ultiverse has launched three DApps: Meta Merge, Terminus City, and CricketFly, with plans to launch a Gaming Launchpad and Restake Rollup in the future;
2. Released PC and Vision Pro versions of Terminus on Steam, featuring AI-driven NPCs; its Genesis NFT Electrisheep currently has a floor price of 2.1699 ETH;
3. Ultiverse will launch Ulti-Pilot—an AI-driven immersive portal—on February 19, offering diverse cosmic gaming experiences.
Lava Network
Overview: Lava Network aims to become a marketplace for blockchain data. It incentivizes node providers and decentralized application users to feed blockchain data into its network. Similar to how Airbnb allows owners to monetize unused space, Lava enables any node operator to monetize their bandwidth while ensuring data quality through protocol enforcement.
Investors: Modular blockchain developer Lava Network completed a $15 million seed round co-led by Jump Capital, Hashkey Capital, and Tribe Capital, with participation from North Island Ventures, Dispersion Capital, Alliance DAO, Finality Capital Partners, and unnamed executives from Celestia, Cosmos, StarkWare, Filecoin, and other blockchain ecosystems.
Highlights:
1. Before its mainnet launch planned for the first half of this year, Lava offers reward points called Magma, which users can earn by switching their RPC connections to Lava;
2. Users can earn referral rewards, receiving 10% of the points earned by those they refer;
3. Initially, only activity on NEAR, Ethereum, Evmos, Axelar, and soon Starknet will qualify for point accumulation.
Breakdown of Funding by Sector:
DeFi
Liquid staking protocol Hydro Protocol announced a new funding round on February 12, with participation from Injective, Vessel Capital, Moonhill Capital, SkyVision Capital, Exnetwork Capital, Quantstamp, BlackDragon, Trinito, verse2, PAKA, coinseeker.co, CSP DAO, ODIG, and DoraHacks, along with a group of top-tier angel investors. The funding amount was not disclosed. Hydro Protocol is a native LSD+LSDfi protocol built on Injective, launched its mainnet on January 31, 2024, and currently boasts a TVL exceeding $100 million.
Intent-based derivatives trading protocol IntentX announced a $1.8 million strategic funding round led by Selini Capital, with participation from Orbs, Mantle Ecofund, Mirana, Kronos Research, and Manifold Trading. The funding aims to strengthen IntentX’s partnerships with market makers and the broader DeFi ecosystem. IntentX is a decentralized exchange leveraging a solution network to offer perpetual crypto trading. This round will support deeper integration with market makers, with further details on solutions to be revealed later.
On-chain debt and credit system Concrete Protocol announced a $7.5 million funding round backed by Tribe Capital, Hashed, Portal Ventures, SALT, and others, aimed at solving liquidation issues in crypto. Concrete is an appchain built for on-chain debt and credit, offering higher yields, no liquidations, and advanced forecasting.
Stablecoin developer Ethena Labs raised $14 million in a round co-led by Dragonfly and Maelstrom, the family office of BitMEX founder Arthur Hayes.
DePIN
DePIN infrastructure provider DePHY closed a multi-million dollar seed round at a $40 million valuation, with participation from Foresight Ventures, Blockchain Builders Fund, IoTeX, Paramita, FutureMoneyGroup, Waterdrip Capital, DefinanceX, PAKA, and Candaq Fintech Group. Funds will be used to expand developer communities and platform operations. Additionally, DePHY will deploy its trusted DID (Decentralized Device Identity) solution on Solana and recently received a grant from the Solana Foundation.
GameFi
AI-powered all-in-one Web3 gaming platform Ultiverse completed a $4 million strategic round led by IDG Capital, with participation from Animoca Brands, Polygon Ventures, MorningStar Ventures, Taiko, ZetaChain, Manta Network, DWF Ventures, and Jacob KO (Partner at Superscrypt). This funding brings Ultiverse’s valuation to $150 million. Ultiverse CEO Frank Ma said: “Next week, Ultiverse will launch Ulti-Pilot, an immersive, AI-driven portal offering diverse cosmic gaming experiences. The team plans to launch a Gaming Launchpad, Restake Rollup, and additional DApps in the future.”
Web3 game developer Overworld secured a $10 million seed round led by Hashed, The Spartan Group, Sanctor Capital, and Galaxy Interactive, with participation from Hashkey, Big Brain Holdings, and Foresight Ventures. The studio is developing its first game, also named Overworld—a free-to-play Web3 anime-style action RPG running on Xterio.
Dubai-based Web3 gaming service provider Exverse announced a $3 million funding round led by Cogitent Ventures, Cointelligence, and Moonrock Capital, with participation from KuCoin Labs, Epic Games, Seedify, and ChainGPT. Exverse is currently using Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 5 to develop a first-person shooter Web3 game, and the new funds will support operational expansion and accelerate development.
Web3 digital identity startup Metropolis announced a $1.2 million funding round, with participation from Cointelegraph Accelerator, Lamina1 Ecosystem Fund, ACS, Outlier Ventures, Protocol Labs, Primal Capital, Zephyrus Capital, Cluster Capital, EthLizards, Acacia Digital, Block Consult, IBC, and several strategic angel investors. Founded two years ago by siblings Rania and Rashid Ajami, Metropolis is a 360-degree curated ecosystem integrating unique assets, e-commerce, avatars, gaming, art, and experiences across digital and physical worlds.
Modular
Modular blockchain developer Lava Network completed a $15 million seed round co-led by Jump Capital, Hashkey Capital, and Tribe Capital, with participation from North Island Ventures, Dispersion Capital, Alliance DAO, Finality Capital Partners, and unnamed executives from Celestia, Cosmos, StarkWare, Filecoin, and other blockchain ecosystems. Prior to its planned mainnet launch in the first half of the year, Lava offers Magma reward points, which users can earn by switching their RPC connections to Lava. Node operators joining Lava are rewarded for providing high-performance RPC services.
Infrastructure
Cross-chain interoperability protocol Analog announced a $16 million raise at a $120 million valuation, led by Tribe Capital, with participation from NGC Ventures, Wintermute, GSR, NEAR, Orange DAO, Mike Novogratz’s Samara Asset Group, Balaji Srinivasan, and others. Analog is developing cross-chain communication tools to enable interoperability across multiple blockchain networks. Its core offerings include the Rust-based Timechain blockchain network, a universal messaging protocol, developer tool Analog Watch, and the Timegraph SDK and API suite, allowing app builders to compose applications across chains.
MPC wallet company Fordefi announced a $10 million funding round led by Electric Capital, with participation from Paxos and Alchemy.
Fordefi is expanding its self-custody MPC wallet product into a retail-facing service platform for exchanges, fintech platforms, and Web3 companies, while further reducing interaction risks with DeFi applications.
DevOps platform Sphinx for deploying and managing smart contracts announced a $2 million pre-seed round, with participation from Archetype, Nascent, Volt Capital, and others. Built specifically for Foundry users, Sphinx brings DevOps practices to web3.
SEQ development team NodeKit, based on Avalanche, announced a $1.2 million pre-seed round led by Borderless Capital, with participation from Avalanche Blizzard Fund, Polygon Ventures, and Wormhole Cross-Chain Ecosystem Fund. SEQ is a shared sequencer Layer 1 network designed to help rollup chains launch and decentralize transaction ordering. SEQ will operate as an independent blockchain or subnet within the Avalanche ecosystem.
Digital ownership research company Witness completed a $3.5 million seed round co-led by Haun Ventures and Coinbase Ventures. The funds will support the development of a verification protocol to address gas fees and scalability challenges in crypto. The team includes members from Paradigm, Google, and Facebook.
NFT
End-to-end watch trading platform Watches.io completed a $1.9 million pre-seed round led by Lemniscap, with participation from Big Brain Holdings, Marin Ventures, Soft Holdings Inc, Builder Capital, Darkside Capital, Non-Fungible Technologies, and others. Watches.io is an end-to-end watch tracking and trading ecosystem enabling users to monitor their watch portfolios with precise, real-time market data, explore diversification opportunities, and execute seamless buy-sell transactions.
NFT-backed lending platform MetaStreet announced a $25 million funding round, with participation from Andrew Kang, dingaling, GMoney, MrBlock, DCF God, Dingaling, Sisyphus, Spencer, FreeLunchCapital, Jae Chung, GoodAlexander, and others. MetaStreet also launched its ERC404 governance token MSTR, aiming to improve liquidity and explore synergies between NFTs and governance tokens. MetaStreet claims MSTR will redefine NFT finance and propel the project toward full decentralization.
NFT analytics platform Helika announced an $8 million Series A round led by Pantera Capital, with participation from Sparkle Ventures, Diagram Ventures, Sfermion, and angel investors Spencer Tucker, Damon Gura, and Marc Alloul. The company will use the funds to accelerate development of its AI-powered game management platform.
Yuga Labs, the developer behind Bored Ape Yacht Club, announced the acquisition of Proof, creator of the Moonbirds NFT series. Yuga Labs declined to disclose terms. The company stated it will integrate Moonbirds into its gamified virtual universe "Otherside." In 2022, a16z led a $50 million Series A for Proof and also invested in Yuga Labs that same year.
CeFi & Others
Web3 marketing hub Mercure DAO announced a $1.5 million funding round to help projects build the future of blockchain.
Brett Harrison, former president of FTX US, announced that his crypto startup Architect raised $12 million in a round led by BlockTower Capital and Tioga Capital, with participation from CMT Digital, ParaFi Capital, A Capital, Twelve Below, Coinbase Ventures, SALT Fund, SV Angel, and Third Kind Venture Capital. Architect has now raised a total of $17 million to date.
Automated security protocol Drosera announced a $1.55 million funding round, with participation from Anagram, Arrington Capital, UDHC, Comfy Capital, Bodhi Ventures, Metamatic, BaseDAO, Asymmetric, Zeal Capital, Everstake, 01Node, Marin Ventures, Infinite Capital, and NxGen. Drosera is an automated security protocol designed to detect vulnerabilities and reduce financial losses.
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