SBF testifies in court

Edition #84 - 27 OCT 2023

Sam Bankman-Fried took the witness stand on Friday for the first time in front of jurors in his criminal fraud trial. In his first statements, he testified that he "knew nothing" about crypto prior to starting his crypto exchange, FTX, and that he did not defraud anyone.

gaming developments

• ​​Blockchain-based horse racing game Third Time raised $2M in a Seed funding round led by Sfermion, with participation from Reciprocal Ventures, Big Brain Holdings, 32bit Ventures, 6th Man Ventures (6MV).​​

• ​​Voxel sandbox game inspired by Minecraft Hytopia (ex NFT Worlds) raised $3M funding round led by Delphi Digital.

• ​​Game studio behind upcoming first-person shooter Shrapnel Neon Machine (Shrapnel) raised $20M in a Series A funding round led by Polychain Capital, with participation from Griffin Gaming Partners, Brevan Howard Digital, Franklin Templeton, IOSG Ventures, Tess Ventures.

metaverses & AI

• ​​​​​​​​​​​​Real-world metaverse for virtual property trading Upland raised $7M in a Series A funding round led by EOS Network, with participation from C3 Venture Capital, Animoca Brands.

• Ready Player Me is partnering with a handful of major brands to launch branded character skins using their IP. Some brands include Angry Birds, “The Voice”, and Warner Music Group.

defi

• ​​​​​​​​BNB Chain launches Greenfield mainnet for decentralized data storage​​.

• ​Gamified decentralized derivatives platform powered by Base PRINT3R raised $500k in a Pre-seed funding round led by MH Ventures, with participation from 300DAO, PrimapesDAO, Homeless Ventures, 2Shares, Onchain Wizard.

funding rounds

• ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Trusted crypto platform for user guidance Beluga raised $4M in a Seed funding round led by Fin Capital, with participation from Anagram, UDHC, Dispersion Capital, Aptos Network, 2PunksCapital, Borderless Capital, Kyber Capital, 186 Ventures, W11 Capital, Rubik Ventures.

• ​​Web3 cybersecurity company Blockaid raised $33M funding round from Ribbit Capital, Variant Fund, Cyberstarts, Sequoia Capital, Greylock.

• ​​Blockchain infrastructure service platform smlXL raised $13.4M funding round led by a16z crypto, with participation from Greylock.

• ​​Ethereum privacy protocol with asset anonymity Nocturne raised $6M in a Seed funding round led by Bain Capital Crypto, Polychain Capital, with participation from Vitalik Buterin, Bankless Ventures, Hack VC, Robot Ventures.

• ​​Blockchain-based healthcare data platform Rymedi raised $9M in a Series A funding round led by RW3 Ventures, White Star Capital, with participation from Blockchange Ventures, Blizzard.

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