Quick take:
- Botanix will use the funds to build Spiderchain, a Bitcoin-native L2 primitive with full EVM equivalence.
- Botanix co-founder Willem Schroé believes his new BTC L2 can scale the Bitcoin ecosystem to eight billion users.
- The seed round brings the total raised to $11.5 million following a previously unannounced $3 million pre-seed round completed last year, the Block reported.
Botanix Labs, a Web3 startup building on Bitcoin has raised an $8.5 million seed round from Polychain Capital, Placeholder Capital, Valor Equity Partners and ABCDE. The fundraising brings the total raised to $11.5 million following a previously unannounced $3 million pre-seed round completed last year.
Andrew Kang, Fiskantes, Dan Held, The Crypto Dog, Charlie Spears, Altcoin Sherpa, Dovey Wan, Jebus, Icebergy, Crypto ISO and Davis were among those who joined as angel investors.
Botanix said it will use the fresh capital to accelerate the development of Spiderchain, a Bitcoin-native layer-2 primitive that leverages Ethereum Virtual Machine to scale the Bitcoin ecosystem.
Commenting on the fundraising, Botanix co-founder and Spiderchain inverter, Willem Schroé said his team wants to build “an infrastructure that supports a global financial system running on Bitcoin for the next 100 years.”
“The Spiderchain can scale the Bitcoin ecosystem to eight billion users and unlock trillions in capital that has sat idle for years. We’re proud to have the support of so many industry veterans who share our vision for reshaping how the world thinks about building on Bitcoin,” Schroé said in a statement.
The Botanix team describes Spiderchain as an infrastructure that secures funds from the Bitcoin base layer using a series of randomised decentralized multi-sigs resembling a spider’s web.
According to Botanix, Spiderchain enables smart contracts and dApps on Ethereum to be copied and run natively on Bitcoin within minutes. The infrastructure also allows users to withdraw from crypto exchanges like Coinbase, Binance and Kraken to a web3 wallet connected to an L2 like MetaMask without using wrapped assets or leaving the Bitcoin network, The Block reported.
Botanix claims to have already generated more than 200,000 active addresses while in testnet, as well as, facilitated 10,000 “experimental” token launches and dozens of decentralised applications ahead of its highly anticipated mainnet launch of Spiderchain scheduled to take place in the summer.
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