98 financing events occurred in December, amounting to over $909M
Financing Overview
In December 2023, a total of 98 financing events were counted, 78 more than last month. Among them, the infrastructure track had the largest number of financings: 30; the track with the highest total financing amount was CeFi, with 210 million.
Infrastructure
A total of 30 financings occurred in the infrastructure track, with the total financing amount reaching US$150 million. Among them, there are 17 financing events with disclosed amounts:
Projects
Andalusia Labs
Project introduction: Andalusia Labs is a digital asset risk infrastructure provider with three main digital asset technology solutions: a layer 2 blockchain called Karak, a cryptocurrency risk management market called Subsea, and a cryptocurrency risk management market called Watchtower. Security-focused institutional platform. All aim to provide digital asset support to institutions, developers and consumers through their respective niches.
Financing information: Andalusia Labs (formerly known as RiskHarbor), which focuses on digital asset risk infrastructure, completed a US$48 million Series A financing at a valuation of over US$1 billion. Lightspeed Venture partners led the investment, Mubadala Capital, Pantera Capital, Framework Ventures, Bain Capital Ventures and Digital Currency Group, among others.
Dynamic
Project Information: Dynamic is a multi-chain wallet-based authentication and authorization platform that allows developers to leverage wallet-based interactions in minutes. With Dynamic, developers can implement a simple SDK in under a minute and control all authentication, onboarding, and authorization functionality from the dashboard. Developers can enable additional chains with a single click, manage users, introduce complex onboarding processes, block OFAC and risky wallets using Chainalysis, and more—all without touching the code.
Financing information: Web3 identity verification platform Dynamic announced the completion of US$13.5 million in financing, led by a16z and Founders Fund. In June 2022, Dynamic completed a US$7.5 million seed round of financing, led by a16z, with participation from Castle Island Ventures, Solana Ventures, Circle Ventures, Breyer Capital, Hypersphere, Chapter One and others.
Babylon
Project information: Babylon is a layer1 blockchain founded by Professor David Tse of Stanford University. The project’s mission is to bring Bitcoin’s unparalleled security to all PoS blockchains without any additional energy costs. The team is comprised of Stanford researchers and experienced developers, as well as experienced business consultants.
Funding info: Babylon has raised $18 million in a round led by Polychain Capital and Hack VC. Framework Ventures, Polygon Ventures, Castle Island Ventures, OKX Ventures, Finality Capital, Breyer Capital and Symbolic Capital also participated in the financing.
Shadow
Project Information: Shadow is a developer platform that gives users complete control over the on-chain event data of any contract. Developers can emit private shadow logs to monitor, test, debug, and run contract analysis. The company's first product allows anyone to enhance any contract with custom event and view capabilities to get the exact data they need," and is now available as a public demo. Shadow uses so-called "shadow forks" to provide private An execution environment designed to reflect the state of the public blockchain in real time.
Financing information: Shadow completed a $9 million seed round led by Paradigm, with participation from Coinbase Ventures, Electric Capital, the Ethereum Foundation, Uniswap and Flashbots.
CESS
Project information: CESS is a platform that integrates blockchain networks and decentralized storage systems, aiming to support Web3's global decentralized data services, including large-scale commercial applications that require high-end security, performance, storage and data retrieval. . At present, CESS has also revealed that it will release tokens in the first quarter of 2024, and will cooperate with the Web3 task platform TaskOn to launch an event to celebrate the token issuance.
Financing information: Cumulus Encrypted Storage System (CESS) received approximately US$8 million in financing. Thirteen venture capital institutions including HTX Ventures, Infinity Ventures Crypto, DWF Labs, Mentha Partners, Vespertine Capital, Web3 Foundation, Singchain Investment, 7 O'Clock Capital, SolrDAO, FishDAO, OneBlock+, Winkrypto and Polkadot Ecological Research Institute participated in this event invest. The funding will be used to drive technological advancements, expand global operations, and strengthen CESS’s position in the decentralized infrastructure space.
DeFi
A total of 15 financings occurred in the DeFi track, with the total financing amount reaching US$19 million. Among them, there are 9 financing events with disclosed amounts:
Projects
Curvance
Project Introduction: Curvance is a decentralized stablecoin lending protocol initially focused on LPs from the Curve, Convex, Aura and Frax ecosystems. Curvance seeks to allow users to achieve optimized yields while maximizing capital efficiency through peer-to-peer lending. Assets such as cvxCRV, auraBAL, and yCRV can earn similar or higher APRs than they would on the original platform, but with the added ability to collateralize deposits for secure stablecoin loans. The interest rates on these loans are based on several factors, including pool APR, price volatility, token liquidity, and loan-to-value ratios.
Financing information: Curvance completed a $3.6 million seed round from investors including Arbitrum developer Offchain Labs, cross-chain messaging platform Wormhole, and angel investors including Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal. Core contributors from crypto projects Scroll, Mantle, Eigenlayer, GMX, Curve Finance, Convex Finance, Balancer, Aura Finance and Pendle Finance as well as DAOs including Frax Finance.
bitSmiley
Project introduction: BitSmiley is the MakerDAO+Compound of the Bitcoin ecosystem, providing a comprehensive solution for Bitcoin DeFi by solving the most significant gap in the current Bitcoin ecosystem - stablecoins and lending infrastructure. In addition to offering stablecoins in the bitRC20 format over-collateralized in BTC, BitSmiley also facilitates peer-to-peer lending based on BRC20. In addition, it established insurance and CDS derivatives based on the lending framework.
Financing information: BitSmiley, a DeFi solution for the Bitcoin ecosystem, announced the completion of a round of financing led by ABCDE and OKX Venture.
GameFi
A total of 11 financings occurred on the GameFi track, with the total financing amount reaching US$110 million. Among them, there are 5 financing events with disclosed amounts:
Projects
Poglin
Project description: Poglin is a game company led by Jia Shen, a game developer who has developed games such as "Pokémon Medallion", "Battle Cats" and the international version of "Disney Tsum Tsum". Gacha Monsters' first self-developed game is Poglin. The alpha version of Poglin will be launched in Q1 2024. Poglin is planned to be built into a multimedia IP covering animation, games, Web3 and physical goods. Active users of this ecosystem will be based on Get rewards for their gaming activities.
Financing information: Japanese entertainment and gaming startup Gacha Monsters has completed a US$3 million seed round of financing, led by Animoca Brands, with participation from Infinity Ventures Crypto, FBG and Big Time Games.
Matr1x
Project introduction: Matr1x is a metaverse brand that plans to build the Matr1x brand through self-developed high-quality games or cooperation with third parties, game IP development cooperation, global e-sports events, etc. Matr1x will interpret its game trilogy (Cyber Earth - Mars Immigration - Interstellar Exploration) through three large-scale games with a unified world view: Matr1x FIRE (first-person shooter), Matr1x WAR (shooting + MMORPG) and Matr1x EVOLUTION (SOC) .
Financing information: Web3 entertainment platform Matr1x completed a US$10 million Series A financing, with investors including South Korea’s second largest financial group Hana Financial Investment, HashKey Capital, Amber Group, SevenX Ventures, etc.
Matr1x said it is also currently raising Series A+ funding.
Sleepless AI
Project Introduction: Sleepless AI is an AI-based virtual companion game that leverages AIGC and LLM to create rich story-based gameplay and organically developed interactions with characters. The project is currently developing three games, the first of which is HIM, a virtual boyfriend Otome game with unique SBT characters that are immutable and on-chain. Sleepless AI is also the 42nd phase of Binance’s new currency mining project.
Financing information: Web3+AI gaming platform Sleepless AI announced the completion of a new round of financing led by Folius Ventures. The specific amount was not disclosed.
NFT
A total of 9 financings occurred in the NFT track, with the total financing amount reaching US$150 million. Among them, there are 6 financing events with disclosed amounts:
Projects
LINE NEXT
Project introduction: LINE NEXT is a company dedicated to developing and expanding the global NFT ecosystem. LINE NEXT is composed of two companies. LINE NEXT Corporation, headquartered in South Korea, focuses on global NFT platform strategy and planning, and LINE NEXT Inc., headquartered in the United States, is committed to developing and operating NFT platform business. LINE NEXT aims to transform the NFT experience for companies, creators and users.
LINE NEXT plans to officially launch its global NFT platform DOSI in January 2024, when it will be integrated with the Japanese NFT marketplace LINE NFT and launched as a mobile application to users around the world. LINE NEXT will also provide new solutions to help services and brands directly own and trade existing digital products. In addition, LINE NEXT also plans to launch new services on the Finschia chain to accelerate the popularity of Web3. The new service includes a social application that allows users to communicate based on characters they create, as well as the launch of new Web3 games utilizing BROWN & FRIENDS characters that anyone can play. LINE NEXT and Crescendo will participate in the Finschia Foundation as governance members.
Financing information: LINE NEXT, the NFT subsidiary of Japanese social giant LINE, completed US$140 million in financing, led by Crescendo Equity Partners, a private equity firm backed by Peter Thiel. This round of financing will be used to expand its global business and develop new services.
Previously, LINE NEXT completed US$10 million in financing, with investors including SoftBank, Naver, CJ ENM, Shinsegae, LINE Games, YG Plus, Hashed, K Auction, etc.
Mocaverse
Project introduction: Mocaverse is a metaverse product under Animoca Brands. Mocas are a group of bold and infinitely creative creatures who call Mocaverse home. But the expansion of space caused the Mocas to separate, and the distance between them increased tenfold. In addition, the Mocaverse team is building Web3 native tools to empower products in the gaming, culture, and entertainment verticals, allowing users to create their own digital identity, accumulate reputation, and earn and spend loyalty points.
Financing information: Mocaverse, an NFT series owned by Animoca Brands, announced the completion of a new round of financing of US$11,888,888. This round of financing was participated by Block1, OKX Ventures, Foresight Ventures, Polygon Ventures, Dapper Labs, etc.
Mocaverse’s total funding to date has reached $31.88 million (up from $20 million in the previous round), with Animoca Brands raising funds through the issuance of new ordinary shares at a price of AU$4.50 per share.
SocialFi
A total of 6 financings occurred in the SocialFi track, with the total financing amount reaching 37 million US dollars. Among them, there are 4 financing events with disclosed amounts:
Pprojects
Formless
Project Description: Formless is a decentralized network and digital space that empowers individuals to connect, create, collaborate, and share in a multi-player digital economy, built for peer-to-peer coordination, shared ownership, and the formation of communities around physical and digital properties.
Financing status: In December 2023, Formless completed a US$2.2 million seed round of financing, with participation from a16z crypto, Contango Digital Assets, Polygon Sandeep Nailwal, Beacon Accelerator, WAGMIventures, MH Ventures, Knights Capital, etc.
Medallion
Project description: Medallion provides a dedicated digital hub for artists to promote album releases, tour dates and merchandise releases, while selling digital collectibles and sharing exclusive content to deepen connections with fans.
Financing status: Web3 fan platform Medallion announced the completion of a $13.7 million Series A round of financing, which was co-led by Dragonfly and Lightspeed Faction. Funding from this round will be used to introduce new early access opportunities such as previews of unreleased music and offering pre-sale tickets, as well as other member benefits such as video premieres or new updates. Artists will also be able to sell new exclusive and limited edition digital collectibles/NFTs such as poster bundles and trading cards.
Tools and information services
A total of 9 financings occurred in the tools and information services track, with the total financing amount reaching 20 million US dollars. Among them, there are 4 financing events with disclosed amounts:
Projects
Three
Project introduction: Tres is a financial accounting software platform for web3 companies. Tres aims to improve Web3 companies’ accounting processes by collecting and aggregating digital asset data from different wallets and accounts into its data platform, enabling Web3 companies to more easily monitor, manage and automate their financial income and expenses.
Funding information: Web3 tax startup Tres Finance has raised $11 million in Series A funding, led by Lightspeed’s new fund Faction, with participation from New Form, Boldstart Ventures, Cyber Fund and Ambush Capital. The financing brings Tres’ total funding to $18.6 million.
CeFi
A total of 5 financings occurred in the infrastructure track, with the total financing amount reaching US$210 million. Among them, there are 5 financing events with disclosed amounts:
