BRIEFINGS

Smith + Crown’s summary of important news across the industry

Oct 05, 2022
  • Horizon raises $40M.
    Blockchain game developer Horizon raised $40M in a Series A funding round led by Brevan Howard and Morgan Creek Digital with participation from Ubisoft and Take-Two Interactive. The funds will be allocated to building out the Sequence developer platform, Niftyswap marketplace, Skyweaver game and core team.
    Sources:
  • Golden raises $40M.
    Data protocol Golden raised $40M in a Series B funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz. The move brings the company’s total funding to $60. Currently in testnet, Golden’s mainnet launch is planned for Q2 2023.
    Sources:
Sep 28, 2022
  • Boba Network expands to Avalanche.
    Layer-2 scaling solution Boba Network has expanded its support to the Avalanche blockchain. The first layer 2 solution on Avalanche offers developers a new scaling toolkit and intends to help meet scalability demands. SushiSwap is also deploying to the Boba Network on Avalanche.
    Sources:
  • Strike raises $80M.
    Bitcoin payment provider Strike raised $80M in a Series B funding round led by Ten31 with participation from Washington University in St. Louis and the University of Wyoming. The funds are allocated to enhance the company’s payment network for merchants and consumers, including Blackhawk, NCR, and Shopify.
    Sources:
Sep 21, 2022
  • Wintermute hacked for $160M.
    Market maker Wintermute has been exploit by attackers via the company’s DeFi operations for $160M. Lending and OTC services were not impacted. This hack comes just six days after the Tron Network announced their selection of Wintermute as the ecosystem’s official market maker.
    Sources:
  • Ethereum completes Merge upgrade.
    The Ethereum network has transitioned from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake consensus with the successful implementation of the Merge upgrade. The upgrades are intended to lower environmental impacts and increase network throughput, among other state goals. Upgrades planned for the near future include the addition of sharding.
    Sources:
Sep 14, 2022
  • Starbucks selects Polygon for its loyalty program.
    Starbucks NFT-based loyalty program Odyssey will use Polygon to enable users to purchase digital collectible stamps that offer benefits and immersive experiences. The company previously hinted at developing Web3 experiences in May when it announced plans to launch NFT collections for customers.
    Sources:
  • Mysten Labs raises $300M.
    Crypto startup Mysten Labs raised $300M in a funding round at a $2B valuation, led by FTX Ventures. Additional participation came from Binance Labs, Coinbase Ventures, Circle Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Andreessen Horowitz. The company will use the funds to build out its Sui blockchain and expand into Asia-Pacific.
    Sources:
Sep 07, 2022
  • Fuel Labs raises $80M.
    Fuel Labs raised $80M in a round led by Blockchain Capital and Stratos Technologies with participation from Alameda Research, CoinFund, Bain Capital Crypto, TRGC, Maven 11 Capital, Blockwall, Spartan, Dialectic and ZMT. The startup aims to provide a modular execution layer with superior speeds to industry standards. Fuel Labs previously raised $1.5M in September of...
    Sources:
  • Arbitrum One upgrades to Nitro.
    Layer 2 scaling solution Arbitrum has migrated its current chain to Arbitrum Nitro. The upgrade increases network speeds and reduces transaction costs through call data compression. Arbitrum Nova, a separate chain focused on social and gaming, went live in August and is built on the Nitro stack.
    Sources:
LOAD MORE