Overview of Bitlayer: The latest Bitcoin-native Layer 2 project led by Franklin Templeton

On July 23, the first Bitcoin Layer 2 project based on BitVM, Bitlayer, announced the completion of a $11 million Series A funding. This round of financing was co-led by top investment firms Franklin Templeton Digital Assets and ABCDE Capital, with Framework Ventures, which previously led Bitlayer's seed round, also participating in this round.

In addition to the leading investors, other participating investment firms include Stake Capital Group, WAGMI Ventures, Skyland Ventures, Flow Traders, GSR Ventures, FalconX, Metalpha, 280 Capital, Presto Labs, and Caladan, as well as notable angel investors such as BRC20 founder DOMO and FactBlock KBW co-founder Brian Kang.

Bitlayer is a Bitcoin Layer 2 project strategically invested in by Franklin Templeton, a Bitcoin spot ETF service provider. The collaboration marks an important milestone, indicating Bitlayer's leading position in technological innovation within the entire Bitcoin ecosystem and demonstrating that traditional financial institutions are increasing their recognition and support for blockchain technology.

"I am honored to collaborate with these top funds that are driving the development of the Bitlayer ecosystem," said Charlie Hu, co-founder of Bitlayer Labs. "The participation of leading institutions in our Series A funding shows our leading position in the Bitcoin ecosystem. Our goal is to establish a Bitcoin-native Layer 2 that is secure and equivalent to Bitcoin finality, creating history for Bitcoin."

Regarding the lead investment, BM AN, managing partner of ABCDE Capital, stated: "After leading Bitlayer's previous funding round, we are pleased to continue leading Bitlayer's Series A funding. Bitlayer has stood out among Bitcoin Layer 2s, accumulating over $500 million in TVL and 300 ecosystem projects, building the most prosperous Bitcoin Layer 2 ecosystem. As it achieves native verification on Bitcoin, Bitlayer will become the first native Bitcoin Layer 2, marking a groundbreaking moment in Bitcoin's history."

Kevin Farrelly, managing partner at Franklin Templeton, stated: "We believe that Bitlayer's uniqueness and technology have the potential to unlock new use cases and opportunities for Bitcoin. We look forward to exploring collaboration opportunities between the Bitlayer team and our other Bitcoin-focused financial products. This investment underscores our commitment to supporting innovation in the digital asset space."

Since its establishment, Bitlayer has been dedicated to developer deployment, ecosystem building, and user acquisition. Currently, Bitlayer has achieved several milestones, including the release of the Bitlayer technical white paper, launching a developer incentive airdrop program, going live with Mainnet - V1, launching a Dapp leaderboard competition, and hosting a series of Bitlayer mining festivals, among many other accomplishments.

According to data from DeFiLlama, the current total locked value (TVL) on Bitcoin Layer 2 chains is approximately $1.2 billion, with Bitlayer leading the field with a 32.78% share, followed by Merlin, Rootstock, and CORE with shares of 18.27%, 14.75%, and 13.61%, respectively.

Additionally, Bitlayer is building the largest ecosystem map for Bitcoin Layer 2, with hundreds of projects currently being developed on the Bitlayer network. These projects span various sectors, including infrastructure and developer tools, wallets, DeFi, NFTs, gaming and the metaverse, as well as RWA, demonstrating robust growth.

The Future of Bitlayer

For a long time, the Bitcoin community has been committed to achieving scalability while maintaining core security and decentralization principles. However, many existing solutions often fail to balance these aspects, leading to a significant market demand for solutions that can address all three challenges simultaneously.

The funds raised in this round of financing will be used to strengthen Bitlayer's global expansion and support more teams in building native protocols on Bitlayer. By providing a faster and more cost-effective trading experience, Bitlayer will accelerate Bitcoin's application in the DeFi space and pave the way for its widespread adoption.

On the technical side, since launching Mainnet - V1 on April 15 of this year, the Bitlayer development team has been focused on researching Mainnet - V2, which is a Bitcoin-native rollup. Its Layer 2 state transitions will be supported by a Bitcoin-friendly proof system that combines ZK and fraud proofs.

In the future, with the full support of strategic investors and ecosystem partners, Bitlayer will continue to drive significant growth and adoption for Bitcoin, becoming a leading Bitcoin Layer 2 infrastructure.

About Franklin Templeton Digital Assets

Franklin Templeton Digital Assets is part of global investment management firm Franklin Resources, Inc. [NYSE: BEN], with its subsidiaries operating under the Franklin Templeton name, serving clients in over 150 countries. Franklin Templeton Digital Assets has been active in the digital asset ecosystem since 2018, building blockchain-based technology solutions, developing a range of investment strategies, and operating node validators.

About ABCDE

ABCDE is a venture capital firm focused on investing in leading crypto builders. Co-founded by Huobi co-founder Du Jun and former internet and crypto entrepreneur BMAN, both have over 10 years of experience in the crypto industry. The co-founders of ABCDE have built billion-dollar companies from scratch in the crypto industry, including publicly traded companies (1611.HK), exchanges (Huobi), SaaS companies (ChainUP.com), media (CoinTime.com), and developer platforms (BeWater.com).

About Bitlayer

Bitlayer is the first Bitcoin-native Layer 2 that is secure and equivalent to Bitcoin. Bitlayer's core goal is to address the trade-off between security and Turing completeness in Bitcoin Layer 2 through cryptographic innovation and blockchain engineering.

Bitlayer aims to become the computational layer for Bitcoin, introducing super scalability while inheriting its security, providing users with a high-throughput, low-cost trading experience.