Weekly Summary: Focus on the Bitcoin Ecosystem as Babylon Chain Raises $70 Million to Build BTC-Secured Web3 Economy

In this edition, we revisit the Bitcoin ecosystem amid its rapid growth, which is highlighted by this week’s $70 million fundraising by Bitcoin-based Babylon Chain.

May 31, 2024

Bitcoin Takes Centre Stage

While the Bitcoin price continues to find resistance around the $70k level, the total value locked (TVL) in the chain also seems to have pulled back slightly.

As of this writing, the Bitcoin chain had a TVL of about $1.154 billion putting it in the top 10 chains by total value locked according to DeFiLlama data. The chain reached an all-time TVL high of about $1.365 billion on April 11.

However, while the data seems to point towards some stagnation Bitcoin’s dApp ecosystem shows no signs of slowing as developers continue to secure funding for their projects.

Babylon Chain the blockchain looking to unlock the crypto staking and restaking power of the world’s biggest cryptocurrency by market cap secured significant funding from leading Web3 venture firms.

Bitcoin-Based Babylon Chain Closes $70M Funding Round Led by Paradigm

The fundraising also attracted participation from Bullish Capital, Polychain Capital and others.
The company plans to use the capital to accelerate its “mission of building a Bitcoin-secured decentralised economy.”
Babylon’s Bitcoin staking protocol allows Proof-of-Stake (“PoS”) systems including PoS chains, L2s, Data Availability layers and oracles to acquire staking capital from Bitcoin.

David Tse, co-founder of Babylon, said in a statement: “We are thrilled by the confidence shown by Paradigm, Bullish Capital, Polychain Capital and other investors. This funding will accelerate our mission to make Bitcoin the security backbone of PoS systems. Our team is dedicated to advancing the utility of Bitcoin beyond its traditional roles and enhancing the security of the entire blockchain ecosystem.”

Unstoppable Domains’ Expanding Ecosystem

Unstoppable Domains continues to spearhead the Web3 domains market adding to its growing list of partnerships.

The company is doubling its efforts on the digital identity front as well as it looks to onboard masses onto Web3.

In its latest deals, Unstoppable Domains secured a partnership with institutional-grade custodial solutions provider Fireblocks, just days after collaborating with NFT Workx to launch the real-world asset tokenisation platform’s first tokenised identity solution for RWAs.

Unstoppable Domains Launches Self-Custody Wallet Powered by Fireblocks

Web3 domain issuer and digital identity provider is launching its first multi-party computation wallet with Fireblocks.
The wallet supports minting domains directly within the Unstoppable Domains workflow, simplifying acquiring and managing digital assets.
The Unstoppable Domanains wallet allows users to prevent unauthorised transactions by enabling them to deactivate the wallet remotely, in the event the device is lost or stolen.

Matt Gould, founder and CEO at Unstoppable Domains, said in a statement: “We want to bring the entire domain industry on-chain. To do that we needed to make a wallet simple enough for the average domain user. Using MPC technology we’re able to offer backup and recovery, enhanced security, and a simple interface for domain owners.”

Michael Shaulov, CEO and Co-founder of Fireblocks commented: “We are thrilled to have the Unstoppable Wallet built on Fireblocks’ enterprise-grade infrastructure, providing maximum flexibility, the highest levels of security, and ease of use.”

NFT Workx Taps Unstoppable Domains to Launch First Tokenised Identity Solution for RWAs

The new Web3 identity solution will provide customers with loyalty incentives through assets tokenised at the point of sale.
NFT Workx uses its eCommerce platform, mobile app and third-party online shopping platforms like Shopify and WooCommerce to tokenise real-world assets.
The .WRKX top-level domain (TLD) allows users to navigate Web3 using their unique “Name.WRKX” digital identities.

Sandy Carter, COO of Unstoppable Domains said in a statement: “The genius of NFT Workx is that it provides a simple, seamless value proposition for Web3. By creating Digital Collectibles of products at the point of sale via a range of major e-commerce platforms such as Shopify and WooCommerce, NFT Workx is a compelling demonstration of the power of Web3 to reduce fraud, strengthen consumer protection, and navigate digital identity in the decentralised future.”

Adam Leese, CEO NFT Workx “As experts like Larry Fink have recognised, tokenised IDs are crucial to reducing fraud, money laundering, and corruption. Thanks to Unstoppable, we can now create a list of domains that are associated with trademarks or well-known individuals and prevent these domains from being made available for purchase.”

More Crypto Funding News

Babylon Chain was not the only big winner in crypto fundraising this past week, with Real World Asset stablecoin issuer Anzen and decentralised AI infrastructure developer GaiNet both securing funds for their projects.

Based on the latest rounds of funding, the industry stayed on course for a new quarterly high since the recovery began this year, as revealed in our previous report. This continues to build on the success of the first quarter.

On-chan Oracle developer Switchboard also reported significant fundraising, with PlayAI also accelerating its gaming-focused chain.

Web3 social media also hit the headlines again with Neynar, after Farcaster spotlighted last week’s report.

Neynar Secures $11M Series A Round to Develop Tools for Web3 Social Networks

Haun Ventures led the round with participation from a16z’s CSX, Coinbase Ventures, and Union Square Ventures.
Web3 social media protocols allow users to own and control their data, addressing one of the biggest challenges facing traditional social networks.

Neynar co-founder Rishav Mukherji compared his company to what cloud computing does for internet users, “[providing] a service for remotely storing files, applications, and data, eradicating the need for desktop computers to always be online and providing insurmountable memory.”

GaiaNet Ramps Up the Development of Its Decentralised AI Infrastructure with $10M Funding

The fundraising attracted participation from EVM Capital, Mirana Ventures and Mantle EcoFund with Lex Sokolin and Brian Johnson joining as angel investors.
GaiNet plans to use the fresh capital to accelerate the development of its decentralised infrastructure for AI networks and develop educational tools for STEM students.

GaiaNet CEO Matt Wright said in the statement: “With the recent investment, we’re able to take a step further in our commitment to redefining the boundaries of AI, making them more accessible, data bias-resistant, collaborative, and privacy-centric.”

Tribe Capital Co-leads $7.5M Strategic Round for On-Chain Oracle Developer Switchboard

Tribe Capital and Rockwayx co-led the round and participation from Solana Foundation, Aptos and StarkWare with Helius Labs CEO Mert, Joe McCann, Brian Long, Geoff Renaud, DJ Chaudhry, Rooter and theackheavy joining as angel investors.
Switchboard plans to use the capital to accelerate the development of its permissionless and secure oracle solutions for developers and communities.

“Switchboard Oracles are run inside confidential runtimes, preventing the oracle from observing the data they are collecting or operations they perform. Hence, the end-user has the first look advantage via data propagation,” the company wrote in the Whitepaper.

PlayAI Secures Seed Funding to Build Modular Gaming Chain Powered by AI

The Web3 AI and gaming firm announced Wednesday that it has raised $4.3 million at a valuation of $70 million.
Play AI is backed by leading Web3 VCs including P2 Ventures, Jump Crypto, Alphawave, Zentry, MH Ventures and Tykhe Block Ventures.

Commenting on the announcement, PS Ramees, Play AI CEO said in a statement: “Artificial intelligence is the future of gaming and virtual worlds, but the cost and complexity of development has long been a major roadblock to adoption.”

“By making it incentivised, simple, and secure to deploy, we are ushering in a new chapter for gaming, where any developer can easily add AI elements like non-player character (NPC) agents, auto-generated worlds, automated dialogues, and story trees—either by selecting from a range of pre-trained models, or by putting out a request to the network.”

More News

Mastercard Pilots Crypto Credential Product as It Aims to Simplify Digital Asset Transfers

The product is already enabled on the Bit2Me, Lirium and Mercado Bitcoin exchanges and is initially available in Europe and Latin America.
The product supports sending and receiving cross-border and domestic transfers across multiple currencies and blockchains.

Walter Pimenta, executive vice president of Product and Engineering, Latin America and the Caribbean at Mastercard said in a statement: “As interest in blockchain and digital assets continues to surge in Latin America and around the world, it is essential to keep delivering trusted and verifiable interactions across public blockchain networks.”

PayPal USD Eyes Faster and Cheaper Transactions as It Expands to Solana

The launch will allow Crypto.com, Phantom and Paxos wallet users to make cross-border transfers on Solana with PYUSD.
PayPal said the expansion to the Proof-of-Stake L1 will make transactions for PayPal USD (PYUSD) holders faster and cheaper.

Jose Fernandez da Ponte, Senior Vice President of the Blockchain, Cryptocurrency, and Digital Currency Group, PayPal: “For more than 25 years, PayPal has been at the forefront of digital commerce, revolutionising commerce by providing a trusted experience between consumers and merchants around the world. PayPal USD was created with the intent to revolutionise commerce again by providing a fast, easy, and inexpensive payment method for the next evolution of the digital economy.”

Ether.fi Reaches New TVL Record at $6B Amid Surge in Restaking Protocols

The protocol’s TVL started the year at $100 million, and has since soared by 5,900%.
Ether.fi added $2 billion over the last two weeks alone as investors increased their staking bets amid bullish Ethereum trends.

Besides Ether.fi, the rest of restaking projects have expanded as well, with Renzo and Puffer Finance reaching $2.8 billion and $1.8 billion, respectively, and EigenPie crossing the $1 billion mark

SKALE’s Monthly Transactions Reach New Record of 47 Million

SKALE has a modular architecture where communities can build and manage hub chains by category, which act as a Web3 services layer.
So far, Nebula has seen over 30 million transactions performed in May, a new record high.

The most popular hub chains are Europa (for DeFi), Nebula (for gaming), Calypso (for NFTs), and Titan (for general apps).