The Venture Codex

Participated · Seed · Aug 2023

MPCVault offers non-custodial, multi-signature wallets-as-a-service for enterprises, using multi-party computation so no single user holds a full private key. Its product includes transaction approval policies and a security layer that scans for phishing URLs, detects suspicious behavior, checks interacted addresses, and performs semantic analysis and transaction simulation. The company aims to be a "financial operating system for crypto companies" (the PayPal of crypto) with services like multichain wallets, salary payments, reconciliation, and statement reporting. Since launching its multi-sig wallet service in January, MPCVault surpassed $500 million in assets under management in seven months and has moved over $1 billion in assets. It serves more than 100 institutional customers, including crypto exchanges, venture capital firms, and other web3 projects, and is headquartered in Sunnyvale with offices in London and Singapore. Founder Jason Li notes the business depends partly on the broader crypto industry's recovery amid plunging token prices and VC funding, although B2B transaction volume remains substantial according to the company.

Participated · Seed · Oct 2022

Gritti provides a web3 social fitness app focused on building positive habits via engaged communities and gamification. The company is currently holding a closed beta and plans a full open beta later this year. It is launching its first NFT sneaker drop, the “Gritti Genesis Sneakers,” with 2,000 pairs in the first phase. Gritti intends to use newly raised funds to expand operations and accelerate product development. The company has assembled a board of advisors that includes Horst Bente, Jared Johnson, Bryant Chou, Umar Ali, and Sami Moughrabie. Financially, the company completed a seed financing to support its next growth phase.

Participated · Seed · Jul 2022

DEXILON is a next-generation decentralized derivatives exchange running a limit order book on a native blockchain built atop the Cosmos SDK. The platform supports launch of derivative contracts for non-crypto assets including metals, energy, soft commodities, and FX, and combines a decentralized matching engine with proprietary oracles. It targets institutional-grade trading with low costs, no gas for traders (gas covered from taker fees), and features designed for market makers. DEXILON has developed an innovative liquidation pool that lets users bid for liquidated positions rather than selling them into the market, intended to reduce flash-crash risk. The company launched a testnet and plans a mainnet launch later the year, and was founded in 2021.

Participated · Series A · Feb 2022

NFTGo is a one-stop NFT data analysis platform that provides NFT data analysis, transaction aggregation, and asset management services. The company recently launched data API and aggregator API solutions to extend its offerings. NFTGo describes itself as aiming to be the world's leading NFT data intelligence provider and to build a gateway for Web2 users to enter the NFT ecosystem. It also says it seeks to help Web3 users engage with NFTs more effectively and to benefit participants in trading and utilizing NFTs. NFTGo was founded in 2021 and positions its product suite around data intelligence and trading tools. The company has raised over $10 million in total investment to date. NFTGo.io operates an all-in-one NFT data analysis and aggregation platform that surfaces real-time NFT insights and a range of features including a search engine, data visualization, rarity scoring, whale tracking and NFT Drops. The company has developed a high-performance cross-chain data acquisition engine that monitors blockchains in real time and parses NFT metadata according to mainstream standards. NFTGo has introduced proprietary indicators such as liquidity, FOMO level and profit-and-loss metrics. The team is over 30 people with core members from Stanford, Harvard, Korea University and Zhejiang University. NFTGo plans to use recent funding to accelerate global hiring, add support for more blockchains and introduce additional data metrics and features. The company also published a 2022 NFT industry research report and distributed it via NFT minting.

Participated · Seed · Jan 2022

Folks Finance is a remote DeFi hub that lets users lend, borrow, trade and manage digital assets across multiple blockchains. Its core product is the xChain app, which enables cross-network lending, borrowing and trading across Avalanche, Base, Ethereum, Arbitrum and BNB Chain. The company plans to accelerate crosschain expansion of xChain and integrate many more networks in the near future. Since its 2022 mainnet launch Folks powers over 15,000 active wallets monthly and is the largest DeFi app on Algorand, with an all-time high TVL of $220 million. Led by CEO Benedetto Biondi, Folks has raised $6.2M in total funding to date, including the new Series A at a $75M valuation. Folks Finance provides a borrowing and lending protocol built on top of the Algorand blockchain. Users can deposit liquidity to earn continuous economic returns and request crypto loans by locking deposited funds as collateral. The company completed a protocol design review and is currently in the smart contract security verification phase. It plans an official launch on the Algorand TestNet early this year and will release Folksy Guys, an NFT collection for the Folks Finance community. The team will publish a research paper on the protocol economic model soon and is working to establish milestones for version 2.0. Folks Finance is the result of research and engineering by Blockchain Italia and is led by CEO Benedetto Biondi. The company raised $3M in Seed funding to expand operations and accelerate growth.