The Venture Codex

Led · Equity · May 2026

Gemini operates a cryptocurrency exchange and custodial business founded in 2014 by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss. In Q1 the exchange reported revenue of $50.3 million, a 42% year-over-year increase, while trading volume declined 53% to $6.3 billion. The company has faced regulatory scrutiny, including a 2024 settlement with the New York Department of Financial Services. To address market headwinds and pursue broader ambitions, Gemini says it is transitioning toward a full-stack market company with plans that may include expanded custody, staking, derivatives and DeFi services. Its financial position was augmented by a $100 million Bitcoin investment from Winklevoss Capital intended to bolster liquidity, product development and compliance efforts.

Participated · Seed · Mar 2026

Zcash Open Development Lab (ZODL) is an independent development group formed by the former engineering and product team of the Electric Coin Company (ECC) after their January 2026 resignation. Led by former ECC CEO Josh Swihart, the lab is responsible for advancing the core Zcash protocol and building user-friendly privacy tools. Its flagship product is Zodl (formerly Zashi), a self-custodial mobile wallet that enables shielded ZEC transactions using zero-knowledge cryptography. Since launching in 2024, Zodl has driven more than a 400% increase in Zcash’s shielded pool activity and has processed over $600 million in ZEC swaps since October. The team plans to hire additional engineers and expand product features to make private digital payments easier for everyday users. ZODL operates independently of ECC, which remains under the nonprofit Bootstrap, but continues to handle much of the network’s core software work.

Participated · Equity · Dec 2025

N3XT is a newly formed blockchain bank that aims to provide regulated banking and financial services tailored to digital assets and Web3 businesses. The venture was founded by Scott Shay, the founder and former chairman of Signature Bank, bringing traditional banking expertise to the crypto sector. Jeffrey Wallis, formerly Signature Bank’s head of digital asset and Web3 strategy, has been appointed as N3XT’s CEO. Although the company has not disclosed operating metrics such as user numbers or revenue, it has attracted significant investor interest early in its life. To date, N3XT has secured a total of $72 million across three funding rounds, capital the team intends to use to build its banking infrastructure, expand product offerings, and obtain the requisite regulatory approvals. The focus appears to be on bridging conventional banking standards with blockchain-native capabilities for institutional and retail clients.

Led · Equity · Nov 2025

Cypherpunk Technologies, formerly Leap Therapeutics, has reoriented its corporate mission from biotech toward building a sizeable treasury of Zcash, a privacy-preserving cryptocurrency it views as a "privacy hedge" complement to bitcoin. Backed by Gemini co-founder Tyler Winklevoss, the firm has already purchased 203,775 ZEC at an average price of roughly $245 per coin—about $50 million in deployed capital—and intends to scale its holdings to at least 5 % of Zcash’s 21 million-coin maximum supply. The company argues that privacy-protecting assets will be critical in a digital future, positioning Zcash as “encrypted bitcoin” or “digital cash.” Even with the pivot, Cypherpunk retains its oncology drug programs inside a wholly owned subsidiary that keeps the Leap Therapeutics name. Leadership changes accompanied the rebrand: Khing Oei became board chair and Will McEvoy chief investment officer, with Douglas Onsi remaining CEO. The firm now trades on the Nasdaq under the ticker CYPH. Its financial resources include a freshly raised $58.9 million treasury seed from Winklevoss Capital, most of which is earmarked for further ZEC accumulation. ZEC itself has recently rallied above $700 before settling near $460, underscoring the market volatility the company is embracing.

Participated · Series E · Oct 2025

Crusoe Energy Systems develops and operates vertically integrated, energy-sourced data centers optimized for artificial-intelligence computing. Its flagship offering, Crusoe Cloud, provides high-performance GPU resources to customers such as Cursor, Decart, Fireworks, Odyssey and Together AI. The company combines rapid energy sourcing, proprietary data-center design, and a managed AI cloud platform to deliver lower-cost and lower-emission compute. To expand service breadth, Crusoe recently acquired Atero, a GPU management and memory-optimization firm, accelerating its managed AI services roadmap. Geographic expansion is underway: the firm is adding capacity in Norway and Iceland and has opened offices in Dublin, Sunnyvale, and Tel Aviv. Major build-outs include a 1.2-gigawatt data-center campus in Abilene, Texas, and a newly announced 1.8-gigawatt campus in Wyoming, with additional multi-gigawatt sites planned across the U.S. Following its latest financing, the company’s valuation is expected to exceed $10 billion, underscoring strong investor confidence in its growth trajectory.