Participated · Seed · Jan 2022

SOMA.finance operates a decentralized marketplace for digital assets, compliant digital securities, and NFTs. It is a joint venture between DeFi platform MANTRA DAO and Tritaurian Holdings, owner of FINRA‑licensed broker‑dealer Tritaurian Capital. The platform aims to be a fully compliant decentralized exchange and suite of products for institutional and retail investors, offering built‑in KYC/AML and a permissionless regulated AMM. SOMA.finance plans to enable trading of digital assets of all kinds, including STOs and NFTs, and to support listings under Regulation CF, Regulation D, Regulation S and Regulation A. Led by John Patrick Mullin and Bill Heyn, the company intends to offer its services globally, including in the United States. It recently closed a Seed funding round to finance these efforts.

Participated · Equity · Oct 2021

Hex Trust is a Hong Kong-based provider of digital asset custody services founded in 2018. The company is known for its proprietary bank-grade platform, Hex Safe, which delivers decentralized finance and prime trading solutions to financial enterprises, digital-asset firms, and other organisations. Hex Trust was founded by Alessio Quaglini, Marc Amez-Droz, and Rafal Czerniawski. According to reports, the company raised $88 million in a Series B round that increased its capitalization to $300 million. The articles do not disclose revenue or user metrics. Hex Trust operates Hex Safe, a licensed custody platform for crypto assets. The company recently secured $10 million in fresh funding to bolster market infrastructure and security frameworks for Hex Safe. The round was led by Animoca Brands with participation from several crypto and institutional investors. Hex Trust said the capital will fund expansion in Singapore and Vietnam and establish a footprint in Europe and the Middle East. The custodian also noted it recently obtained a license to provide custodial services from the Monetary Authority of Singapore under the Securities and Futures Act. Investors from Hex Trust's March $6 million Series A also took part in the latest investment. Hex Trust operates a bank-grade custody solution, Hex Safe™, providing custody and treasury management services for virtual currencies, security tokens and NFTs. The company said a strategic investment from Cyberport will enable it to scale operations and recruit talent across Hong Kong and wider Asian markets. Hex Trust plans to enhance its licensing framework to address growing institutional demand for digital assets in Asia and to expand operations into European markets through a partnership with SIA. Management emphasized staying focused on improving Hex Safe™ and on enabling digital-asset adoption by regulated financial institutions and banking platforms. Prior to the Cyberport investment, Hex Trust completed a March 2021 Series A, raising $6 million in capital from a group of investors. Cyberport is managed by the Hong Kong SAR Government and is Hong Kong’s largest tech hub, which Cyberport says helped attract co-investments from professional investors into Hex Trust. Hex Trust is a Hong Kong-based digital asset custody service provider founded in 2018. The company helps banks, financial institutions, and corporates maximize digital asset management. In March 2021 it launched a secure way of storing non-fungible tokens. Hex Trust recently completed a $6 million Series A round led by fintech-focused QBN Capital with participation from multiple crypto and venture investors. Proceeds will be used to advance its Hex Safe offering, establish a compliance section, and recruit talent. The company plans hiring in Hong Kong and Singapore to support these initiatives.

Participated · Equity · May 2019

The Sandbox is a UGC metaverse platform operated by Bacasable Global Limited and backed by Animoca Brands that enables creators and brands to build, publish, and monetize virtual experiences. It opened to the public in alpha in November 2023 and currently has 1,000 user-generated experiences live and more than 5.7 million user accounts connected to crypto wallets. The platform reports 400+ brand partnerships, 250 Trusted Partners, over 25,000 virtual land owners, and 330,000+ unique creators who have downloaded its no-code Game Maker. Its marketplace activity includes 11,000 unique digital assets that have been minted and sold over half a million times, and more than 60,000 avatar NFTs sold across branded collections. Product plans include updates to Game Maker and VoxEdit, new social interactions and avatar abilities, a multiplayer rules system launching in Beta later this year with a public release in 2025, and a mobile decentralized metaverse expected in 2025. The company says it will use funding to continue advancing its vision of a decentralized virtual world and to expand earning opportunities for creators. The Sandbox is a decentralized, open NFT metaverse where players and creators can build immersive 3D worlds, games, and social experiences and safely store, trade, and monetize their creations. The platform emphasizes a player-owned economy and user-generated content, with governance and value creation driven by its community. The Sandbox has partnered with major IPs and brands and its existing IP has more than 40 million global mobile installs. The company says the recent capital will be used to scale growth, expand operations, and accelerate player acquisition across the ecosystem. Strategic partnerships are expected to broaden The Sandbox’s global reach and attract more brands, IPs, and gaming studios. The Sandbox is a subsidiary of Animoca Brands and positions itself as a leading entertainment destination in Web3 metaverse experiences. The Sandbox is being redeveloped by Animoca Brands’ Pixowl division as a blockchain-enabled UGC gaming platform that provides true digital ownership via tokenized game items and NFTs. Creators build static or animated voxel objects with VoxEdit and can sell or transfer assets through a decentralized marketplace. The platform uses the SAND token for community voting, staking, crowdfunding and decentralized governance, enabling creators and players to capture value. Animoca aims for NFT interoperability across games so items retain scarcity, authenticity and value beyond utility. The company plans a curated Marketplace launch in Q3 2019 and a broader game launch expected in Q4 2019. The earlier version logged more than 40 million downloads and over one million monthly active users, metrics Animoca intends to grow with blockchain features and strategic partnerships.

Led · Series A · Mar 2013

Cheers is an app and social network centered on users celebrating positive moments and sharing uplifting content. The product launched just over a year ago in February and is still experimenting with its approach to a positivity-based feed. A key feature, Celebrations, lets users build open collections that the community can contribute to, helping people find topic-specific content. Cheers aims to become a funnel for brands by enabling curated, genuine user-generated positive content and plans to build tools for organizations to leverage that content. The recent funding is intended to help expand the product, build those brand-facing tools, and support user-acquisition efforts. Founder Farhad Mohit (who previously founded BizRate) acknowledges membership numbers aren’t yet where the company would like and says this round will help determine whether a Series B makes sense.

Led · Equity · Sep 2011

Miso Media builds Plectrum, an iPad app that displays guitar tablature and 'listens' to users as they play, advancing the tabs in real time. The app includes an integrated store for purchasing additional tabs. Since launch the catalog has grown from fewer than two dozen songs to over 400, with the company saying it will have over 1,000 songs by the end of the month, backed by partnerships with several music labels to secure rights. Founder Aviv Grill has presented product updates at TechCrunch Disrupt. While currently focused on guitar, Miso Media plans to expand into sheet music, positioning it against competitors like Tonara. Financially, the company previously raised a $600K seed round in December and is now raising additional capital. Miso Media’s core product, Miso Music, is an iOS/iPad app that listens to the notes a user plays and scrolls tablature accordingly, effectively turning the device into a guitar teacher. At the time of the article the app had been submitted to the App Store but had not yet launched. The company holds rights to many songs via the Sony/ATV catalog and can license others from Hal Leonard, while it is working to secure rights from Universal and Warner. Miso plans to use hiring and product improvements to scale: it will double headcount from three to six and invest in expanding its song library and improving audio detection. The startup also intends to add support for additional instruments in future updates. Its monetization model is per-song in-app downloads, charging a few dollars per song.