Quick take:
- P2 Ventures (Polygon Ventures), Taiko, O(1)Labs, Starkware, and Offchain Labs also joined the round.
- Espresso offers scaling and privacy systems for Ethereum Virtual Machine-compatible Web3 applications.
- The company’s shared sequencer protocol enables Web3 apps to leverage scalability without sacrificing decentralisation and security.
Espresso Systems has announced a $28 million Series B round led by Andreessen Horowitz (A16z). The fundraising also attracted participation from P2 Ventures (Polygon Ventures), Taiko, O(1)Labs, Starkware, and Offchain Labs
Espresso is an EVM-compatible protocol focused on providing shared sequencing to layer-2 blockchains on Ethereum. The company’s primary product, the shared sequencer, enables Web3 applications to maintain scalability while leveraging the security features of the Ethereum network.
According to the company’s blog post on Medium, Espresso seeks to support Web3 applications in leveraging scalability on Ethereum without sacrificing decentralization, composability, and credible neutrality.
Espresso said it plans to use the fresh capital to ramp up its product pipeline, accelerate the development of its ecosystem and hire more staff. “We’ll be hiring aggressively to build out our team and expand our efforts.”
The company is also planning to launch a marketplace for shared sequencing, enabling rollups to sell the right to build their blocks to proposers who bid for these rights.
“Proposers can also bid on multiple roll-up blocks to become shared proposers for multiple chains at once, which allows them to facilitate cross-chain activity,” Espresso wrote.
According to Espresso, this marketplace makes it more than just a shared sequencer, consensus protocol, or tool to facilitate interoperability between rollups. It has already received backing from both Espresso stakeholders and Ethereum restakers, opening doors to potentially scale to the entire Ethereum validator network, thus providing assurances to users that their transactions will be completed on the L1.
“Overall, we are building Espresso to be a one-stop solution for rollups to increase utility for their users through improved safety, liveness, and interoperability, while being fully compensated for the value they create and maintaining their sovereignty and autonomy,” the company said.
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