On Feb. 5, Nibiru Chain, a Layer-1 chain focused on developers, announced that it has raised $12 million in funding from various investors including Kraken Ventures, ArkStream, NGC, Master Ventures, Tribe Capital, and Banter Capital. This funding will be used to accelerate the growth of its ecosystem, which offers a built-in dev toolkit, easy-to-use APIs, language SDKs, and a native oracle. With a capacity of 40,000 TPS and 1.4s block times, Nibiru Chain also boasts robust security with the use of CosmWasm smart contracts. Its built-in DeFi super applications, along with native oracle and data-indexing functionalities, make it easier for DeFi projects to select the right technical solutions.
In other news, Radix announced the launch of a 25 million XRD Ecosystem Fund to support and reward developers and entrepreneurs in its ecosystem. The fund is currently worth over $1 million and will be used for various initiatives such as developer incentives, milestone rewards, and grants for co-marketing and partnership opportunities. It will also support the upcoming Scrypto challenges and the second cohort of the Radix Grants Program.
On Feb. 5, Ethereum Name Service (ENS) reached an agreement with GoDaddy to allow users to link their internet domains to their ENS addresses for free. This will make it easier for users to receive payments in crypto by simply using their registered domain name as their wallet identifier. This move is expected to make crypto payments more accessible and user-friendly.
Also on Feb. 5, Oobit, a mobile payments app, announced that it has raised $25 million in a Series A funding round. The round was led by Tether’s investment arm, CMCC Global’s Titan Fund, and also included 468 Capital and Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko. Oobit allows users to pay for purchases using crypto while merchants receive fiat currency. This tap-and-pay feature makes crypto payments more accessible as it can be used at any point of sale that accepts Visa or MasterCard.
In other news, Kodiak Finance, a DEX project based on Berachain, announced the close of a $2 million seed financing round. The funds will be used to scale the project and deliver trading products native to Berachain.
Cube.Exchange, a digital asset trading platform, raised $12 million in a Series A funding round, led by 6th Man Ventures. The round also included investments from Asymmetric, ParaFi Digital, Foundation Capital, Susquehanna Private Equity Investments, and others. This raise comes on top of a $9 million seed round announced in October.
Sanctor Capital also announced the raise of a $10 million early stage Web3 investment fund and a partnership with Press Start to launch a pre-accelerator program called The Multiplayer Fellowship. This program aims to fund 100 teams over the next 18 months, with previous graduates going on to join top accelerators such as a16z Crypto Startup School and Y Combinator.
Upshot unveiled Allora, a trustless, self-improving decentralized AI network, which is designed to empower applications with smarter, more secure AI through a self-improving network of machine learning models. It is backed by industry investors including Polychain, Framework, Blockchain Capital, and CoinFund.
In the blockchain oracle space, Pyth announced the future deployment of Pyth Entropy, which aims to enhance on-chain random number generation for various Web3 verticals such as prediction markets and GameFi. It also unveiled the mainnet deployment of Pyth Price Feeds on LightLink, an Ethereum layer-2 blockchain, allowing developers to access real-time price feeds for their DeFi applications.
Luganodes, a provider of institutional-grade staking services, announced its support for Stacks, a Bitcoin layer-2 network. This will allow institutions to earn native BTC rewards while supporting the network and enjoying faster, cheaper transactions with complete Bitcoin security. Luganodes is also a Signer on the upcoming Nakamoto upgrade, solidifying its commitment to the Stacks ecosystem.
Lastly, Zeitgeist, a prediction market dApp, launched its DLMSR-based automated market maker, marking a significant advancement in the blockchain prediction market. The DLMSR model allows for more flexibility in market creation and liquidity provision, reducing slippage and improving trading efficiency. Additionally, WOOFi, a cross-chain DEX, has launched on Mantle Network, allowing for easy cross-chain swaps from eight top chains, including Arbitrum, Optimism, and Avalanche.
