Participated · Equity · Aug 2024

Orderly Network is a remote developer of a permissionless liquidity layer for Web3 trading led by Ran Yi. Built on omnichain infrastructure, it enables deep liquidity for any asset across multiple blockchains and avoids the risks of wrapped asset movement through cross-chain bridging. The platform empowers developers to create a comprehensive array of financial products for traders of any level. It currently supports six chains: Polygon, Arbitrum, Optimism, Base, Ethereum mainnet, and Mantle. Orderly recently raised over $5M and says it will use the funds to bolster its capabilities and continue its innovation and growth trajectory. During its seed round the company secured $20M from institutional investors including Pantera, Sequoia China, Laser Digital, Dragonfly, and Jump. Orderly Network is a permissionless, decentralized exchange protocol and modular ecosystem built on NEAR, using an on-chain order book. Its platform includes a risk engine, matching engine, and shared asset pools designed for composability so dApps can build on top. The protocol supports financial instruments such as spot trading, margin trading, perpetual swaps, lending, and borrowing. Founded in April 2022 and incubated by NEAR and WOO Network, Orderly focuses on enabling modular dApps to utilize its on-chain order-book architecture. The company plans to use recent funding to recruit across key functions, develop and enhance products, grow the Orderly ecosystem, and establish partnerships. To enhance liquidity, Orderly will launch community lending pools allowing token holders to lend assets to market makers with single-sided liquidity provision and sustainable yields.

Participated · Equity · Jul 2024

Mezo, built by Thesis and led by founder Matt Luongo (also Thesis CEO), is a permissionless Bitcoin economic layer that amplifies Bitcoin infrastructure while preserving BTC-first principles. Its core product facilitates cheap, efficient transactions and provides access to real-world applications through Thesis-built components like tBTC for trust-minimized bridging. The protocol supports staking via stBTC and Acre, Thesis’ Bitcoin-in, Bitcoin-out staking platform. Mezo will use the new capital to accelerate technology development and grow the BitcoinFi ecosystem, including integrations with partners such as Acre and wallet providers to enable Bitcoin “log in” via hardware and web wallets like Unisat, OKX, and Xverse. Ledger plans to integrate Mezo directly into its suite of products, with further integration details to be disclosed. Operational metrics reported to date include $124.5M in total value locked and 2,152 Bitcoin deposited in the protocol; total funding now stands at $30M following Mezo’s April 2024 launch. Mezo is a permissionless Bitcoin Economic Layer launched by Thesis, a NYC-based venture studio, and led by CEO Matt Luongo. It provides a neutral smart-contract infrastructure that is Bitcoin-native and aims to enable cheap, fast transactions for diverse user-centric use cases. Mezo uses a Proof of HODL mechanism that rewards users with yield and increases HODL Score multipliers the longer bitcoin deposits are locked. New users receive five one-time invitations to onboard friends, with reciprocal earnings tied to the size and duration of invited users’ deposits. Mezo plans to go live with ecosystem support from Thesis-built tBTC for trust-minimized bitcoin bridging. The company intends to use the recently raised capital to expand operations and accelerate development efforts.