• Transak

  Participated · Equity · Aug 2025

  Transak provides a single API that enables apps — wallets, exchanges, fintechs and DeFi platforms — to convert fiat to stablecoins via local payment methods, bank transfers, cards and virtual IBANs. The platform combines regulated fiat on/off ramps, virtual bank accounts, real-time liquidity routing and full-stack compliance tooling. Transak is used by over 450 applications and serves users in more than 75 countries. The company has processed over $2 billion in transaction volume, with nearly 30% coming from stablecoin flows, and supports both retail and institutional use cases. It holds regulatory approvals in the United States, United Kingdom, European Union, Canada, Australia and India. Co-founded by Yeshu Agarwal and Sami Start, Transak plans to expand its stablecoin payments stack and scale operations into new markets.

• ZKEX

  Participated · Seed · Jul 2024

  ZKEX is a multi-chain decentralized exchange focused on cross-chain trading. The company completed a $2.5 million seed financing. The funds will support launching a fiat on‑ramp service and a mobile application in the next quarter. Participating investors named in the article include Fenbushi Capital, KXVC, RockTree Capital, NGC Ventures, L2 Iterative Ventures, Crypto.com Capital, IDG Blockchain, Whale Ground, Moonhill Capital, Blocklabs Capital, Optic Capital, Hyperithm Group and G20 Group. No operating metrics or past rounds are disclosed in the article. The capital is intended to accelerate product development and upcoming rollouts.

• ContributionDAO

  Led · Seed · Feb 2024

  ContributionDAO provides an institutional-grade staking platform and is developing products at both infrastructure and application levels for blockchain projects. Its offerings include Proofsquare.xyz, a community infrastructure suite with smart automation and a virtual assistant, and Lightlayer.xyz, an Ethereum execution client designed for lightweight, scalable, instant sync for validators and staking services. The platform reports over $400 million in assets under management on its node staking platform and more than 10,000 community contributors and investors. As of January 2024, ContributionDAO has contributed to global projects including Axelar, Sui, Celestia, and Sei Network. The company plans to use new funds to further its community management tools and expand across the Southeast Asian blockchain market.

• Kiln

  Participated · Equity · Jan 2024

  Kiln is a French white-label staking technology provider that offers on-chain smart contracts, SDKs and APIs to enable one-click pooled staking integrations in non-custodial wallets. It also operates a large network of Ethereum validator nodes and is the largest operator by validators with just over 4% market share on Ethereum. Kiln programmatically manages staking through its smart contracts, collecting an automated commission on rewards, which ties its revenue growth to assets under management. The company currently manages 1,168,288 staked ETH, roughly $3 billion at current exchange rates, and has increased its stake under management fivefold over the past year. Kiln provides dedicated validator operations for partners and counts clients such as Ledger, Crypto.com and Coinbase for pooled staking services in their non-custodial wallets. The company plans product expansion and the establishment of an office in Singapore. Kiln has raised a total of $35 million since its inception. Kiln is a Paris-based, enterprise-grade staking technology platform provider offering infrastructure and tooling for staking across major proof-of-stake blockchains. Its product suite includes Kiln Connect (a single SDK to integrate staking, rewards data and custodians), Kiln On-Chain (smart contracts for ETH staking and automated rewards management), Kiln Dashboard (staking dashboard, administration, reporting and data export) and Kiln Validators (dedicated or shared validators with enterprise SLAs on multi-cloud Kubernetes). The company manages over $500 million of assets staked under management. Customers include Binance US, GSR and Ledger. Kiln plans to use the newly raised funds to expand its staking infrastructure product range. The business is co-founded by CEO Laszlo Szabo, CPO Ernest Oppetit and COO Thomas de Phuoc and targets institutional-grade staking customers.

• Connext

  Participated · Equity · Jun 2023

  Connext operates a blockchain interoperability protocol and communication layer that lets developers build interchain applications which can access funds and data across many chains while leveraging existing infrastructure for security. The company says proceeds from its latest raise will enable the setup and operation of the Connext Foundation to steward protocol development, issue development grants, and fund community-led initiatives. The strategic round brings Connext’s total funding to $23.2 million and values the company at $250 million. Operating metrics cited in the article include more than 1.2 million crosschain transactions to date, the addition of over 20,000 new users in the month following its V2 launch in late February 2023, and 35 companies actively building on the protocol, including Metamask, Planet IX, and DODO. Since being formed in 2017, Connext Labs has built foundational blockchain infrastructure, including a 2018 payment-focused Layer-2 scalability system and contributing to the 2019 MolochDAO framework. Connext develops NXTP, a base protocol enabling trustless, low-cost, and extensible communication between EVM-compatible chains and L2 systems. The network runs a set of nodes (routers) that provide liquidity and relay data between chains, earning fees for routing. NXTP emphasizes three advantages: full trustlessness via a lock/unlock mechanism, easy extensibility to new sidechains and L2s, and low capital/gas costs by avoiding unnecessary L1 transactions. Connext has been live with its v1 protocol since February 2021 and launched its interoperability network in January 2021, processing over $500 million in transactions to date and reaching $40 million in weekly volume after rapid early growth. After a recent $12 million ecosystem funding round, the team is focused on growing liquidity, adding support for more chains/L2s, layering additional interoperability protocols, and transitioning the protocol to community ownership.

No current team members are available.