Infinex, a platform that aims to usher in the “post-CEX era,” has raised $67.7 million through the sale of its Patron NFTs. Notable participants in the round include Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund, Moonrock Capital, Wormhole, Variant Fund, Solana Ventures, and more.
The fundraising round made use of a new “patronage” model, which involved the selling of the non-fungible tokens to venture capitalists and the Web3 community. Infinex sold 43,244 NFTs in total, across multiple blockchains and ecosystems. These included Ethereum, Solana, Arbitrum, Optimism, Base, and Polygon.
With the NFTs now unlocked as of October 28th, holders can sell them on marketplaces like OpenSea and Blur. Infinex staggered the sale of the NFTs, issuing them in stages, although the price for an individual NFT remained the same regardless of the stage. In a celebratory X post, the company wrote that “Patrons are helping to write the next chapter of crypto.”
Kain Warwick of Synthetix founded Infinex in the summer of 2023 to rival centralized exchanges. Through an Infinex account, users can interact with decentralized applications across multiple EVM blockchains and Solana. The account functions, in part, like a non-custodial wallet, with the users in control of their funds, and is recoverable.
To compete with centralized exchanges, Infinex plans to offer fiat on-ramps and spot trading soon, which will add convenience and increased functionality for users. Time will tell if Infinex’s plan is successful, but there’s no doubt a $67.7 million raise is a good start.
Fundraising Rounds Highlight Crypto Bull Market
Although Web3 has taken a backseat to artificial intelligence in the sectors that have attracted the most interest from investors, there still have been a number of notable fundraising rounds in the land of crypto. And the companies raising money are varied as well, ranging from game studios to burgeoning NFT platforms. Here are some of the headlines.
- DeFi Futures Protocol nftperp Raises $3M in Funding Round
- Autoverse Studios Raises $8 Million to Develop Auto Legends
- Galaxis Raises $10M from Chainlink and Other Investors
- LINE NEXT Raises $140M for NFT Marketplace
- Superstate Raises $14M to Create Tokenized Investment Funds
As these stories show, companies are still raising money in Web3 even if interest is tempered. There may be good reasons for that. 15 years in, crypto still shows a lot of promise, with the tantalizing possibility of revolutionizing the world of finance still there. And DeFi itself is experiencing a comeback, with active loans reaching $13.3 billion and total-value-locked increasing.
One cryptocurrency exchange, Kraken, announced a pending Ethereum L2 blockchain designed specifically for DeFi. Infinex, although it will compete with centralized exchanges, is part of that DeFi movement. We’ll check back to see if it uses its newly raised funds for a good purpose, although with the number of high-profile backers, we think it has a chance of doing so.