RBV Weekly Newsletter🧔📖Week of 10/24/24

Team RBV Open Deals, Portfolio Updates, Crypto News, & More

Author

Joshua Howard
October 24, 2024

Welcome to the latest edition of the Red Beard Ventures newsletter, where we dive into exciting updates and insights from all over blockchain, frontier tech, and the angel investing landscape. 


📣 As a reminder, Red Beard Ventures has a syndicate, fund, and a tokenomics accelerator:

  • The Red Beard Ventures Syndicate is stage agnostic and invests in Frontier Technology with a focus on Web3, Space, FinTech, Sports, Robotics, Biotech, and Climate. We invest anywhere between $100k - $1.5M.

  • The Red Beard Ventures Fund I invests $100k - $1M in Pre-seed and Seed blockchain-based companies.

  • Denarii Labs is a tokenomics accelerator where we invest $100k into companies interested in designing and launching a token, over a twelve-week hands-on program.

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RBV Spotlight 🚀

LayerZero now live on Hedera! 

Hedera is a high performance public blockchain that uses its novel hashgraph consensus, which produces energy-efficient transactions for decentralized applications and tokenization. The consensus mechanism which is known for producing speed and security, now connects to LayerZero’s protocol, allowing for the easier movement of assets and liquidity across multiple blockchain networks.  

This integration is expected to attract EVM-based institutional liquidity, improving Hedera’s attractiveness for DeFi and tokenized assets builders, as well as further demonstrates the traction and organic adoption of LayerZero’s technology, congrats to the teams!!

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Portfolio News

  •  Alethea AI builds infrastructure tools for generative AI platforms and runs  Ali Agent, a platform for creating and managing digital personas. Ali Agent’s personas utilize the ALI Utility Token for different functions within the ecosystem.

  • ALIagents.ai is rolling out  ALI Token staking, offering a new way for token holders to participate in and support the platform while potentially earning rewards.

  • More details on the staking program and its features are expected to be announced soon, follow the team and learn more here: 

  • Mintify’s Bitcoin Keys (Ordinals) provide native functionality on the Bitcoin chain, allowing users to earn boosted XP and XP multipliers when trading assets on Mintify using these Keys.

  • Holding Mintify Keys on specific chains, like ETH or Bitcoin, boosts XP earnings and provides multipliers when trading digital assets.

  •  XP can be earned through activities like buying, bidding, or listing on Mintify, with Earn+ collections providing instant or passive XP across supported chains.

  • Shardeum is a highly scalable Layer 1 blockchain that uses sharding technology to ensure low fees and high throughput. They are currently running their Atomium incentivized testnet.

  • Participants can earn SHM tokens by running validator nodes or completing network tasks.

  • The referral program offers extra rewards for bringing new users into the testnet, learn more here! 

  • Layer3 is partnering with Drift, a decentralized exchange (DEX) which offers an all-in-one platform for decentralized trading with a strong focus on UX.

  • The partnership will integrate Drift’s DEX into Layer3’s consumer hub, giving users access to high-quality trading features with top-tier UX.

  • Users will be able to trade and earn rewards, combining Layer3’s ecosystem and Drift’s decentralized trading solutions. Learn more here!

  • CryptoKitties a Denarii Portfolio Company is a gaming studio and the team behind their first game, All the Zen, a Telegram-based game where players can collect, breed, and trade digital cats as NFTs. It helped popularize the concept of NFTs and digital ownership.

  • The community has hatched 11,350,000 eggs so far and is working towards 12.25 million. Once this milestone is reached, a new game feature will be unlocked in All the Zen. 

  • Learn more about the story, game, and milestones here! 

  • TravelSwap is a platform which enables users to book hotels and vacations using popular cryptocurrencies, making it easy to spend digital assets on real-world travel experiences.

  • SunPump has partnered with TravelSwap to push the boundaries of meme projects on SunPump by integrating cryptocurrency payments for travel, blending digital currency with real-world usage.

  • This collaboration opens up exciting new horizons for meme projects and pushes forward new methods of travel innovations. Congrats to the teams!  

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🔔 Active Investment Opportunities:

xMarkets: Creator-Focused Prediction Market Platform | Polymarket ($1B Valuation) Competitor | Closing this week

  • xMarkets is revolutionizing prediction markets by enabling verified X users with 1,000+ followers to create markets on any topic using AI-driven tools for clarity and efficiency

  • AI agent for market creation, $100 fee for quality curation, multiple resolution methods (LLMs, market creators, pricing oracles), and seamless X integration

  • Secured KOLs with 10M+ followers, planning September launch ahead of presidential election. 

  • Competitor Polymarket valued at ~$1B

  • Led by experienced team: Co-founder AJ, MIT CS grad and former Microsoft ML Engineer, previously founded DeFi projects reaching $50M TVL and $1.1B market cap. 

  • Backed by notable investors: Wes Cowan (Juice.finance), Paul Taylor (BlackRock), OneFlow Digital founder, Rahim Noorani (Satori.finance), Peter Huo (Whampoa Digital), and Eckhardt Capital. 

  • Raising $1.5M Pre-Seed with $15M post-money valuation cap SAFE + $XMKT token warrant. 

  • Link to invest

Enhanced Games: Revolutionizing Sports with Medically Supervised Performance Enhancements | Backed by Peter Thiel and Balaji Srinivasan

  • Enhanced Games is poised to disrupt the world of sports by introducing an alternative to traditional athletic competitions like the Olympics

  • The company already has 6,500+ articles and billions of impressions with just $2.5M marketing spend

  • The Inaugural event is targeted for late 2025

  • Led by President and Co-Founder Dr. Aron D'Souza (previously founded OPEN, backed by NYSE) and Co-Founder Christian Angermayer (founder of Apeiron Investment Group and atai Life Sciences - NASDAQ: ATAI)

  • Backed by notable investors including Peter Thiel (PayPal, Palantir), Balaji Srinivasan (ex-CTO Coinbase, ex-GP Andreessen Horowitz), and Apeiron Investment Group.

  • Revenue from media rights, sponsorships, and pharmaceutical partnerships leveraging athlete performance data.

  • Link to invest

OnChain Studios (Cryptoys): Revolutionizing Digital Toys | Dapper Labs Led Series A+ and Backing from a16z and Draper Associates

  • OnChain Studios is building Cryptoys, fully interactive digital toys on a platform hosting games, apps, and immersive experiences, capitalizing on the rapid shift of children's play to digital formats.

  • $2M in sales during beta, partnerships with Disney, Mattel, and NASCAR, 4 major IPs launched including Star Wars and Mickey and Friends.

  • Patent-pending COPPA-compliant Guardian Controls for under-13 market, built on Flow blockchain, combining Play-to-Earn games with next-level experiences.

  • Strong team and backers: Led by CEO Will Weinraub, backed by Dapper Labs, Andreessen Horowitz, Draper Associates, Acrew Capital, and Coinfund.

  • Raising $10M Series A+ via SAFE with $30M post-money valuation cap and token warrant. 

  • With traditional toy companies struggling to adapt (Mattel $6.4B, Hasbro $9.4B market caps) and digital play leaders thriving (Roblox $28B), Cryptoys is well-positioned in this growing market.

  • Link to invest

PWR Chain: First Blockchain to Create Direct Interoperability with Web2 | Token Warrant

  • PWR Chain is revolutionizing blockchain infrastructure by creating direct interoperability with Web2, enabling seamless deployment of programming languages across external VMs, side chains, and smart contracts.

  • Testnet live since 2023 with various projects already building on the platform. Mainnet launch scheduled for Q4 2024. PWR Chain uniquely eliminates platform limitations, mirroring the decentralized structure of the internet.

  • $6M Pre-Seed raise via SAFT with a $90M pre-money valuation cap and token price of $0.09. 

  • Backed by notable investors including Tim Draper’s Draper Associates, Magnus Capital (Astra Protocol, Desofy), Alphabit Fund (Sire), GVG Capital, and Crypto Oasis Ventures.

  • Co-founder & CEO Melanie Mohr, serial entrepreneur with 20+ years in media and mobile technology, and Co-founder & CTO Edy Haddad, blockchain veteran with on-chain records for gas-efficient smart contracts, are leading this transformative project.

  • Link to invest

StackingDAO: Liquid Staking on Stacks (The largest L2 on BTC) | Building what Lido (1.83B FDV) is for Ethereum

  • Stacking DAO is building a liquid staking protocol for Stacks, the largest L2 on Bitcoin, solving issues like long unlock periods, high minimum requirements, and manual relocking.

  • $110M TVL since December 2023 launch, fastest-growing DeFi protocol in Stacks history, holding 17% of stacked STX.

  • Backed by Portal Ventures, Golden Chain Republic (Republic's Digital Asset Arm), Modular Capital, and Cherry Crypto.

  • Strong potential to become the Lido (current $1.83B FDV) of Stacks, offering auto-compounding tokenized representation of stacked STX (stSTX).

  • Link to invest

Monoquant: Revolutionizing Quantitative Trading for Crypto

  • Monoquant is developing an AI-powered platform that democratizes quantitative trading in the $2.1T cryptocurrency market, allowing investors at all levels to create, backtest, and deploy automated trading strategies.

  • Impressive data moat covering 60% of DeFi and 70% of CeFi markets, with over 4 trillion data points.

  • Secured broker agreements with major exchanges (OKX, Binance, Crypto.com, Bybit, MEXC) spanning ~85% of CEX volume.

  • Backed by Cherry Street Digital Assets Fund and Alumni Ventures.

  • Raising a pre-seed round at an attractive $20M post-money valuation cap with SAFE + token warrant. $MONQ token with 15% unlock at TGE, 3-month cliff, 12-month linear vesting.

  • Link to invest

Travelswap: Exclusive Expedia Crypto Partner Disrupting Travel

  • TravelSwap, an Expedia exclusive, combines travel booking with 100+ crypto payments, tokenized reservations, and rewards.

  • Impressive traction since July 2023 launch: 1,000+ bookings, 50+ B2B partners, 10k+ users (50% MoM growth), 12%+ repeat bookings.

  • 2024 plans: $TRAVL token, last-minute DEX, V2 B2B platform, expanded offerings.

  • Link to invest

SatRepublic: Leading Ordinals Studio Launches tool for collectors and developers

  • SatRepublic, the Ordinals Studio behind Pizza Artifacts, SatScribe is launching Runevo, a mobile-first infrastructure designed to enable users to transact, monitor, trade, and snipe Runes, Rare Stats, and Ordinals.

  • Pizza Artifacts, the first historical collection of Ordinals fully inscribed on the exotic 'pizza' Sats from the pizza transaction of May 22, 2010, trading at 25x mint; SatScribe, the first public platform for inscribing on rare and exotic Sats, which has done over 150k paid inscriptions for users; and Runevo, a collection of 6.025 pre-rune Ordinals that sold out in under 24 hours to raise $1.4mm USD, or 17.4 BTC.

  • Link to invest: 

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🥳 Upcoming Events: 

Events are a great way to stay informed in our industry, so we have had a very full 2024. We would love to hear about any other conferences you will be attending or the remainder of this year, so please let us know as we are still planning our event calendar! 

Stay tuned for updates on future events, and until then, keep spreading joy and positivity in our community!

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🤝 We are also looking for part-time syndicate vertical leads in the following categories - if you are interested please reach out and we can discuss the opportunity in greater detail:

Biotech 

Space 

Robotics & Automation

Climate 

Fintech & SaaS

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Onwards 🚀 

Drew, Elana, Joshua, and Lauren