An Overview of a16z's Web3 Investment Landscape

Written by: Babywhale, Foresightnews

Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) was founded in 2009, with its two founders, Marc Lowell Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, combining their last names to create the name of this well-known venture capital firm. Marc Lowell Andreessen and Ben Horowitz were the founders of the famous American communications company Mosaic in the last century. Although the company ultimately lost out to Microsoft and was acquired by AOL, the technologies it left behind, such as JAVA, SSL, and cookies, remain standard in the industry today. It can be said that the two together created many foundational languages in the current internet technology field.

Subsequently, they co-founded Loudcloud in 1999, a company primarily providing internet infrastructure services, recognized in the industry as one of the earliest entrants into the cloud services field. Unfortunately, Loudcloud encountered the internet bubble of 2000 and was forced to pivot to a software company, Opsware, which was acquired by HP eight years later for $1.6 billion.

In 2009, they co-founded a16z and successfully invested in internet companies including Facebook, Groupon, Skype, Twitter, Zynga, and Foursquare. In 2013, a16z led a $25 million Series B funding round for Coinbase, officially starting its investment layout in the Web3 industry.

According to publicly available information, a16z has invested in over 80 companies or projects in the Web3 field, covering almost all Web3 tracks, including public chains, Layer 2, DeFi, NFTs, gaming, and the metaverse. The following information lists the order of projects based on the chronological order of their first announcement of receiving investment from a16z.

Exchanges

Coinbase was founded in 2012 and was previously the leading cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume, until it was surpassed by FTX in May. Coinbase went public on NASDAQ through a direct listing on April 14, 2021, with a market capitalization of about $61 billion at the close of its first trading day, but its current market cap is now less than $17 billion. a16z led Coinbase's $25 million Series B funding round in 2013.

Yellow Card is an African exchange, and a16z participated in its $1.5 million funding completed in August 2020.

CoinSwitch Kuber is an Indian cryptocurrency exchange, and a16z participated in its $260 million funding completed in October 2021.

Public Chains

Dfinity aims to create the "Internet Computer," an open network that acts as a large virtual host in cyberspace, allowing decentralized versions of many online technology services, such as Uber, Dropbox, and eBay. a16z participated in Dfinity's $61 million funding completed in February 2018 and led its $102 million funding completed in August of the same year.

Celo is a Layer 1 public chain featuring a payment network, with major DeFi protocols deployed on it, including SushiSwap, and Uniswap V3 is also set to be deployed on Celo. According to DefiLlama data, Celo currently has a TVL of over $200 million. a16z led Celo's $25 million funding completed in April 2019.

Avalanche is a blockchain network based on random sampling and metastable decision consensus protocols, with three core platforms: the Exchange Chain (X-Chain), the Contract Chain (C-Chain), and the Platform Chain (P-Chain). a16z participated in Avalanche's $6 million funding completed in June 2019.

NEAR Protocol is a Layer 1 public chain characterized by optimized sharding design, Nightshade consensus, and "large block" design. According to CoinGecko data, NEAR currently has a market cap of over $3.6 billion, ranking 24th. According to DefiLlama data, NEAR's TVL is currently about $410 million. a16z led NEAR's $21.6 million funding completed in May 2020 and participated in its $150 million funding completed in January 2022.

Solana is a Layer 1 public chain project supported by FTX founder SBF, which achieves fast, low-cost, and scalable features through a Byzantine Fault Tolerance (BFT) consensus mechanism utilizing Proof of History (PoH). a16z participated in Solana's $314 million token sale completed in June 2021.

Aleo is a programmable privacy network based on zero-knowledge proofs, which moves the execution of smart contracts off-chain to improve efficiency. Aleo plans to launch its mainnet later this year. a16z participated in Aleo's $200 million Series B funding completed in February 2022 and subsequently led another round of $28 million funding for Aleo.

Aptos is a new public chain project founded by former Meta employees responsible for the Diem project, and a16z led its $200 million funding completed in March 2022.

Bitcoin

Lightspark is a Bitcoin Lightning Network company founded by Meta's cryptocurrency head David Marcus, aiming to explore, build, and expand the functionality and utility of Bitcoin. a16z led Lightspark's funding round completed in May 2022, with the amount undisclosed.

Layer 2

Matter Labs is the development team behind zkSync, an Ethereum Layer 2 network based on ZK Rollup, and a16z led its $50 million Series B funding completed in November 2021.

Optimism is an Ethereum Layer 2 network using Optimistic Rollup, which officially announced the launch of its governance token OP on April 27, with an airdrop scheduled for the second quarter. According to L2Beat data, Optimism currently has a TVL of $541 million. a16z led Optimism's $25 million Series A funding completed at the end of February this year and its $150 million Series B funding completed less than a month later.

Savings / Payments / Trading / Custody (Financial and Financial Tools)

Eco is a financial application that allows users to earn savings interest and cashback by partnering with compliant cryptocurrency custody institutions. a16z led Eco's $26 million funding completed in March 2021.

Talos provides technical support for digital asset trading for financial institutions, including price discovery, automated execution, reporting, clearing, and settlement, with its strategic head being Justin Schmidt, former head of digital asset markets at Goldman Sachs. a16z led its $40 million Series A funding completed in May 2021.

Anchorage Digital is a cryptocurrency custody institution and the first of its kind to receive federal banking licenses from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency in the United States. a16z led Anchorage's $17 million Series A funding completed in January 2019, participated in its $40 million Series B funding completed in July 2019, its $80 million Series C funding completed in February 2021, and its $350 million Series D funding completed in December 2021.

Cross River is a fintech company whose products include cryptocurrency trading, NFT markets, and fiat on- and off-ramps for cryptocurrency wallets. a16z led its $620 million funding completed in March 2022.

Loop is a cryptocurrency payment company aimed at solving the problem of recurring payments in cryptocurrency, planning to develop smart contracts that pay a certain amount of tokens to a target address periodically, with the contract only supporting payment requests from the target address. a16z led Loop's $4 million seed round funding completed in April 2022.

TipTop is a cryptocurrency company founded by Bastian Lehmann, the founder of the food delivery service Postmates acquired by Uber, aiming to provide financial solutions for consumers. The specific details of the project remain confidential, and its website has also hidden some important information. a16z led its $23 million Series A funding completed in May 2022.

Entropy is a decentralized cryptocurrency custody protocol that uses multi-party computation-based cryptographic technology to provide users with a way to deposit and use cryptocurrencies on any blockchain at any time. a16z led its $25 million funding completed in June 2022.

DeFi

Basis was an algorithmic stablecoin project that shut down at the end of 2018 due to regulatory issues and refunded investors' funds. Later, a former engineer from TFL revealed that Basis Cash, a stablecoin project anonymously founded by Terra founder Do Kwon, continued the idea of Basis. a16z participated in Basis's funding round completed in October 2017, with the amount undisclosed; at that time, Basis was called Basecoin. Subsequently, a16z also participated in its $133 million funding completed in April 2018.

dYdX is a decentralized derivatives trading platform based on the StarkEx order book model, supporting contract trading for 37 tokens including Bitcoin and Ethereum. According to L2Beat data, dYdX has a locked value of $962 million, ranking second among all Ethereum Layer 2 network protocols, only behind Arbitrum. a16z led dYdX's $2 million seed round funding completed in December 2017 and its $10 million Series A funding completed in October 2018. Later, a16z also participated in dYdX's $10 million Series B funding completed in January 2021 and its $65 million Series C funding completed in June of the same year.

Compound is a decentralized lending protocol on Ethereum, currently supporting 17 assets including ETH, DAI, and WBTC. According to DefiLlama data, Compound's TVL currently exceeds $4 billion, ranking 7th among all DeFi protocols. a16z led Compound's $8.2 million seed round funding completed in May 2018 and also led its $25 million Series A funding completed in November 2019.

TrustToken operates the DeFi lending protocol TrueFi and the USD stablecoin TrueUSD. According to DefiLlama data, TrueFi's TVL reached over $800 million in August 2021 and is currently about $58 million; TrueUSD currently has a total issuance of over $880 million. a16z participated in TrustToken's $20 million strategic round funding completed in June 2018 and led its $12.5 million funding completed in August 2021.

MakerDAO is a decentralized lending platform and the issuer of the stablecoin DAI. MakerDAO announced in September 2018 that a16z purchased 6% of the total MKR tokens for $15 million.

Uniswap is a decentralized trading platform based on AMM. According to DefiLlama data, Uniswap's total TVL across multiple chains reached $5.95 billion, ranking fifth among all DeFi protocols. On May 24, Uniswap announced that its total trading volume surpassed $1 trillion. a16z led Uniswap's $11 million Series A funding completed in August 2020.

Fei Protocol is an algorithmic stablecoin project that issues the USD stablecoin FEI through a protocol-controlled value (PCV) model, with the total value of the algorithmic stablecoin FEI approaching $540 million. a16z participated in Fei Protocol's $19 million funding completed in March 2021.

Element Finance is a structured product market where users receive principal tokens and yield tokens after depositing assets, allowing users to trade these two types of tokens freely based on their market judgment for cashing out or investing. a16z led Element Finance's $4.4 million funding completed in April 2021 and participated in its $32 million Series A funding completed in October of the same year, which was completed at a valuation of $320 million. Element Finance announced the issuance of the ELFI token in early April, with 10% of the total already airdropped.

Goldfinch is a decentralized credit platform that provides stablecoin loan limits to loan underwriters, who are responsible for issuing loans in various locations. a16z led Goldfinch's $11 million funding completed in June 2021 and its $25 million funding completed in January 2022.

Syndicate is a DAO infrastructure service provider that allows users to create investment DAOs, with participants making investment decisions through governance. a16z led Syndicate's $20 million Series A funding completed in August 2021 and participated in its $6 million funding completed in May 2022.

Angle Labs is a DeFi startup aiming to launch multiple stablecoins and promote the use of stablecoins in DeFi. a16z led Angle Labs' $5 million funding completed in September 2021.

Kosen Labs is a team of former Google DeepMind AI researchers aiming to provide liquidity solutions for DEX through AI. a16z led Kosen Labs' $5 million seed round funding completed in November 2021.

Lido Finance is an Ethereum consensus layer staking protocol that releases liquidity for staked Ethereum. Users can earn stETH by staking Ethereum through Lido and use stETH to participate in DeFi protocols. Currently, the ETH/stETH pool on Curve is severely imbalanced, with stETH accounting for over 70%, and a discount rate of nearly 3%. a16z invested $70 million in Lido in March 2022.

NFT

CryptoKitties is one of the earliest NFT projects, and its launch once caused a spike in Gas fees, leading to severe congestion on the Ethereum network. a16z led CryptoKitties' $12 million Series A funding completed in March 2018.

Foundation is a platform that allows creators to create and sell NFTs, completing $200,000 in funding in March 2020 and $8 million in funding in March 2021, but there is currently no public information showing which round a16z participated in.

Bitski initially aimed to develop a wallet that could be embedded in crypto applications but later pivoted to become an NFT marketplace, aiming to be the "Shopify of NFTs." a16z participated in Bitski's $19 million funding completed in May 2021.

OpenSea is currently the largest NFT trading market, supporting Ethereum, Polygon, and Solana. a16z participated in OpenSea's $100 million funding completed in July 2021, at which time OpenSea was valued at $1.5 billion, and after the last funding round completed in January this year, OpenSea's valuation has reached $13.3 billion.

Manifold is an NFT platform that allows creators to have full ownership of their creative content. a16z participated in its seed round funding completed in October 2021, with the amount undisclosed.

OnChain Studios is developing Cryptoys on Flow, an NFT platform that combines digital toys and games. a16z led its $7.5 million funding completed in October 2021.

Royal is a music NFT platform launched by renowned DJ "3LAU," which presents song royalties in the form of cryptocurrency. a16z led Royal's $55 million Series A funding completed in November 2021.

Sound.xyz is a music NFT platform where creators can use the platform to release limited edition music NFTs, with the music content stored on IPFS. a16z led Sound.xyz's $5 million funding completed in December 2021.

Autograph is a sports and entertainment NFT platform created by American football player Tom Brady. a16z led its $170 million Series B funding completed in January 2022.

Fractal is an NFT marketplace in the Solana ecosystem, launched by Twitch co-founder Justin Kan in December 2021. a16z participated in Fractal's $35 million seed round funding completed in April 2022.

Co:Create is an NFT infrastructure protocol that will provide a smart contract platform for projects to mint NFTs and control royalties paid in native tokens, with the initial version set to launch this fall. a16z led its $25 million seed round funding completed in May 2022.

Social / Creator Platforms / Media

DeSo is a decentralized social blockchain platform founded by Nader Al-Naji, the creator of the decentralized social network BitClout and the algorithmic stablecoin protocol Basis. The DeSo blockchain supports traditional social media platform functions such as creating personal information and posting information, as well as blockchain-native functions like social tokens, tipping, or NFTs. a16z participated in DeSo's $200 million funding completed in September 2021.

Rally is a fan token platform that allows creators and their communities to build their independent digital economies. a16z participated in its seed round funding, with financing details not disclosed.

Mem Protocol is a startup building Web 3 tools for social networks, aiming to establish a decentralized social media protocol centered around "data sovereignty," creating a standardized data specification and a set of common operators to enable individuals to control the collection of their personal information. a16z led Mem Protocol's $3.1 million funding completed in November 2021.

Fanhouse is a creator monetization platform that charges creators 10% of their income and supports fans in purchasing in-app currency "Coins" outside the app to support creators, thereby avoiding app store fees. a16z led its $20 million Series A funding completed in May 2022.

Tally Labs is a Web3 media company aimed at linking communities with creators, and a16z participated in its $12 million seed round funding completed in May 2022.

DAO

FingerprintsDAO is a collector organization for collectors, curators, and producers, dedicated to curating and collecting artworks created using smart contracts in highly creative ways and generating corresponding blockchain fingerprints. a16z participated in FingerprintsDAO's funding round completed in September 2021, with the amount undisclosed.

Friends With Benefits (FWB) is a DAO organization that has launched several projects, including an NFT gallery and a virtual music studio. FWB aims to bring real benefits to DAO members through collaborations with various cities and communities. a16z led FWB's $10 million funding completed in October 2021.

PleasrDAO is a collector DAO that purchased the original Doge NFT for nearly 1,700 ETH in June 2021 and fragmented the NFT into billions of DOG tokens through the NFT fragmentation protocol Fractional, with DOG's market cap once exceeding $300 million. Additionally, PleasrDAO also acquired the NFT "Stay Free" issued by Edward Snowden. a16z invested in it in December 2021, with investment details undisclosed.

PartyDAO is the decentralized organization behind the NFT bidding platform PartyBid, and a16z led its $16.4 million funding completed in June 2022.

Institutions

Oasis Labs is the development team behind the privacy public chain Oasis. Oasis previously launched an ecological development fund totaling $235 million, aimed at supporting the development of projects in the Oasis ecosystem, including DeFi, data DAOs, NFTs, and the metaverse. a16z led Oasis Labs' $45 million private token sale funding completed in July 2018.

Dapper Labs is the developer of Flow and NBA Top Shot, and a16z participated in its $250 million funding completed in September 2021. According to CoinDesk, citing informed sources, Dapper Labs' post-round valuation reached $7.6 billion.

Yuga Labs is the operator of the well-known NFT project Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) and the metaverse project Otherside. a16z led Yuga Labs' $450 million funding completed in March 2022.

Infrastructure

Filecoin is a decentralized storage network developed by Protocol Labs, using proof of space-time and proof of replication to verify storage validity. a16z participated in Filecoin's $257 million ICO completed in September 2017.

Arweave is a decentralized storage network using the SPoRA consensus mechanism, with over 70TB of data stored on the network to date. a16z participated in Arweave's $5 million token funding completed in November 2019 and its $8.3 million funding completed in March 2020.

Nova Labs, formerly known as Helium, is a decentralized communication network where users can earn token rewards by purchasing its hardware devices and operating them. a16z led Nova Labs' $111 million token sale funding completed in August 2021 and participated in its $200 million Series D funding completed in March 2022.

XMTP is a crypto instant messaging network aimed at establishing a native communication protocol in the crypto space to eliminate platform monopolies and prevent spam and other useless information. Its products include a decentralized inbox called Zapmail and a solution for sending messages directly to wallets when protocols or DApps encounter issues. a16z led XMTP's $20 million Series A funding completed in September 2021.

Mysten Labs is a Web 3 infrastructure company founded by senior members of Facebook's crypto R&D department, Novi Research. Mysten's CEO Evan Cheng led Novi and helped develop the Diem blockchain and the Move programming language. a16z led Mysten Labs' $36 million Series A funding completed in December 2021.

Alchemy is a Web3 infrastructure protocol providing cloud-based infrastructure services for Web3 projects. a16z led Alchemy's $250 million Series C funding completed in October 2021 and participated in its $200 million funding completed in February 2022.

Privacy

Orchid Labs offers a VPN with privacy features, where users need to pay fees in tokens to access relay nodes and browse the internet with privacy protection. a16z participated in Orchid Labs' $4.7 million private token sale completed in October 2017.

Nym is a privacy infrastructure project that provides privacy services using middlemen and rewards nodes running the network to improve its efficiency. a16z led Nym's $13 million Series A funding completed in November 2021.

Iron Fish is a privacy blockchain network aimed at becoming a universal privacy layer for all chains. a16z led Iron Fish's $27.7 million Series A funding completed in November 2021.

Gaming / Entertainment

Forte provides blockchain solutions for game publishers, and a16z participated in its $185 million Series A funding completed in May 2021 and its $725 million Series B funding completed in November.

Virtually Human Studio is the developer of the blockchain-based horse racing game ZED RUN, and a16z participated in its $20 million Series A funding completed in July 2021.

Yield Guild Games is a well-known blockchain gaming guild, and a16z led its $4.6 million funding completed in August 2021.

Sky Mavis is the operator of the well-known P2E game Axie Infinity. a16z led Sky Mavis' $152 million Series B funding completed in October 2021 and participated in its $150 million funding completed in April 2022, aimed at compensating victims of the Ronin Network attack.

Mythical Games is a game development company based in Los Angeles, recognized by Forbes as a disruptive technology company to watch in 2019. Mythical stated that its platform will be built on an EVM-compatible sidechain. a16z led Mythical Games' $150 million Series C funding completed in November 2021.

Core Loop is a game studio planning to develop a sandbox MMORPG using blockchain technology. a16z led Core Loop's $12 million funding completed in November 2021.

Faraway is a game studio planning to develop browser-based games on Solana, and a16z participated in its $21 million Series A funding completed in November 2021.

Ireverent Labs is a blockchain gaming company that developed the P2E fighting game MechaFightClub. a16z led Ireverent Labs' $5 million funding completed in November 2021 and its $40 million funding completed in May 2022.

League of Kingdoms Arena aims to create a metaverse game that provides an entertaining gaming experience, including launching PvP arenas, guild wars, commercial platforms (such as NFT markets), GameFi tools (such as staking portals, GameFi dashboards), token rewards for in-game competitions, social media features, esports tools, and interoperable assets. a16z participated in League of Kingdoms Arena's $3 million seed round funding completed in December 2021.

Carry1st is an African Web3 and social gaming publisher, and a16z led its $20 million Series A funding completed in January 2022.

BreederDAO is a metaverse gaming asset production company, with founders including a player guild founder with 500 users and personnel with extensive multi-chain DApp development experience. a16z led BreederDAO's $10 million Series A funding completed in January 2022.

Battlebound is a P2E gaming startup founded by Adam Hensel, who has helped develop well-known games like League of Legends and Overwatch 2. Battlebound is developing two games, Evaverse and Project A, with Project A expected to launch in 2023. a16z led Battlebound's $4.8 million seed round funding completed in March 2022.

LootRush is a blockchain gaming platform that provides a quick-start platform for blockchain games and offers NFT rental services, aiming to lower the barrier for new game players and generate income for NFT owners. a16z participated in LootRush's $12 million seed round funding completed in May 2022.

Metatheory is a technology-driven entertainment company founded by Twitch co-founder Kevin Lin. Metatheory launched in the third quarter of last year, aiming to build a platform that integrates Web3 games, interactive content, and social features, and plans to release NFTs, games, and content this year, with free games and Play-and-Earn mechanisms set to launch in the fourth quarter. a16z led Metatheory's $24 million Series A funding completed in May 2022.

Azra Games is a P2E blockchain gaming company, with CEO Mark Otero being a developer of the game Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes. The company is currently developing its first combat RPG, Project Arcanas. a16z led Azra Games' $15 million funding completed in May 2022.

Adim is a Web3 entertainment company founded by American actor and producer Rob McElhenney, and a16z led its $5 million seed round funding completed in June 2022.

Metaverse

Everyrealm is a metaverse project aimed at shaping the metaverse through investment, management, and development of assets, including NFTs, virtual real estate, metaverse platforms, games, and infrastructure. a16z led its $60 million Series A funding completed in February 2022.

Improbable is a UK-based metaverse company whose Web3 virtual world network M² combines Improbable Morpheus technology with new services aimed at supporting interoperability, digital asset commerce, and Web3 governance, bringing together companies, existing communities, and fans in sports, music, fashion, and entertainment to experience virtual spaces. a16z led Improbable's $150 million funding completed in April 2022.

Wallets

Phantom is a wallet application in the Solana ecosystem, including a browser extension wallet and a mobile wallet. a16z led Phantom's $9 million funding completed in July 2021 and participated in its $109 million funding completed in February 2022.

Valora is a digital wallet in the Celo ecosystem, now operating independently from cLabs. a16z led its $20 million Series A funding completed in July 2021.

Domains / Identity

Handshake is a decentralized domain and certificate authority, and a16z participated in its $10.2 million funding completed in August 2018.

Spruce is a digital identity verification company, with its main products including Ethereum account SIWE (Sign-In with Ethereum) and Kepler. a16z led Spruce's $34 million Series A funding completed in April 2022.

Security

Forta is a real-time monitoring project for smart contract security incubated by OpenZeppelin, scanning all transactions through independent node operators to detect abnormal transactions and threats to smart contracts. When a problem is detected, node operators notify subscribers of potential risks, enabling them to take automated defensive measures. a16z led its $23 million funding completed in September 2021.

Sardine is a fraud detection platform that also launched ACH transfer features, allowing customers to bypass the 3 to 7-day waiting period to access funds. Sardine pre-funds the cryptocurrency purchased by consumers in their wallets and assumes the fraud, regulatory, and compliance risks associated with the waiting period. a16z led its $19.5 million Series A funding completed in February 2022.

Data Analysis

Nansen was founded in 2020 as a tool focused on on-chain data analysis, currently supporting nine public chains or Layer 2 networks, including Ethereum, Polygon, Fantom, Celo, Avalanche, BNB Chain, and Arbitrum. a16z led Nansen's $12 million Series A funding completed in June 2021 and participated in its $75 million Series B funding completed in December 2021.

Cross-Chain

LayerZero is a cross-chain interoperability protocol, with its cross-chain bridge Stargate surpassing $4 billion in total locked value within three weeks of launch. a16z led LayerZero's $135 million Series A+ funding completed in March 2022.

Currency

Chia is a programmable currency platform created by BitTorrent founder Bram Cohen. a16z participated in its $3.395 million seed round funding completed in March 2018 and led its $61 million Series D funding completed in May 2021.

Worldcoin is a global currency aimed at creating a network to connect more people through cryptocurrency. The Worldcoin project created a device called Orb, which uses biometric technology to capture images of people's eyes and convert them into a short digital code, distributing a certain share of Worldcoin. a16z participated in Worldcoin's $25 million funding completed in June 2021. Additionally, according to The Information, citing sources, Worldcoin planned to raise $100 million in March 2022, with a16z also participating.

Ethereum Public Goods

Nomic Foundation is a non-profit organization that evolved from Nomic Labs, the developer of the Ethereum developer tool platform Hardhat. One of the main goals of the Nomic Foundation is to attract more developers to Ethereum by building infrastructure, supporting not only Hardhat but also other developer tools. a16z participated in Nomic Foundation's $15 million funding donation completed in February 2022 (with a target of $30 million).

Carbon Credit Trading

Flowcarbon is a carbon credit tokenization company supported by WeWork co-founder Adam Neumann. a16z led Flowcarbon's $32 million funding completed in May 2022, with the round totaling $70 million, the remaining $38 million completed through token sales.