A16z leads $25M funding for Miden blockchain project
A16z Crypto led a $25 million funding spherical into Miden, an impartial blockchain challenge spun out of Polygon Labs.
Miden closed its $25 million seed rounds led by a16z Crypto, 1kx, and Hack VC, with participation from Finality Capital Companions, Symbolic Capital, P2 Ventures, Delta Fund, MH Ventures, in addition to from angel buyers, together with MakerDAO’s Rune Christensen and EigenLayer’s Sreeram Kannan.
Miden is a zero-knowledge (ZK) proof-powered blockchain centered on excessive scalability by way of its hybrid consensus mode, which strikes transaction execution from the mainnet on “edge gadgets,” referring to customers’ gadgets.
Designed for establishments that worth confidentiality, Miden permits functions to execute each private and non-private transactions with full privateness, in response to an April 29 announcement shared with Cointelegraph.
Execution on edge gadgets may help with the “bottlenecks that restrict conventional chains,” stated Bobbin Threadbare, the co-founder at Miden and former engineer at Meta, including:
“It permits blockchains to scale with out counting on supernodes or sacrificing decentralization, whereas making privateness a built-in function as an alternative of an afterthought.”
The $25 million shall be used to fund Miden’s improvement, and its mainnet launch is slated for the fourth quarter of 2025.
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Miden is “the way forward for blockchains,” says Polygon Labs’ Nailwal
“Miden is what the way forward for blockchains seems to be like. With edge execution at its core, it’s not simply an improve — it’s the blueprint for the ultimate type of blockchain structure,” in response to Sandeep Nailwal, the founding father of Polygon Labs.
“With ambitions to rival Solana, Sui, and Aptos — and to be the epicenter of crosschain liquidity for Agglayer as a local chain and assist develop the Agglayer ecosystem— constructing independently naturally positions Miden to draw the capital and focus wanted to compete on the highest stage,” Nailwal added.
Miden plans to airdrop round 10% of its native tokens to Polygon (POL) tokenholders and stakers to reward its native ecosystem.
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No present blockchain is prepared for mass adoption: Miden co-founder
“The fact is that no present blockchain is prepared for mass adoption,” both missing privateness, scalability, or Web3-native rules reminiscent of censorship resistance, in response to Miden’s Threadbare.
Nevertheless, Miden’s infrastructure could also be a “catalyst for giant institutional adoption,” he claimed, including:
“The fact is that up till this level, blockchains haven’t been within the place to supply privateness with out compromising on efficiency or programmability, which is a significant concern.”
Giant tech companies becoming a member of the area require privateness options with regulatory compliance, leaving a major hole for options like Miden, added the co-founder.
Different trade watchers have additionally criticized the trade’s lack of confidentiality for limiting institutional adoption.
Confidential computing applied sciences reminiscent of absolutely homomorphic encryption might unlock the next $1 trillion value of capital for the crypto area with continued technological improvement, Remi Gai, the founding father of Inco, instructed Cointelegraph.
