Advanced Blockchain: Ecosystem Update August 2022
August 2022 is drawing to a close and Advanced Blockchain as well as all our portfolio companies had an active month, with several notable events occurring across the ecosystem. Read on to learn about the latest happenings within Advanced Blockchain.
Advanced Blockchain AG:
Validator Node
Advanced Blockchain launched and is running its first validator node for Tgrade Finance. Tgrade is currently on mainnet. The Tgrade validator node has started generating revenue as of July 2022 and Advanced Blockchain is supporting Tgrade to drive forward the adoption of blockchain technology.
Tgrade’s Business Model
Tgrade offers a governance framework built using revolutionary blockchain technology, smart contracts, and new forms of decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). Tgrade enables individuals and organizations to create ‘Trusted Circles’ – a self-sovereign governance mechanism – which allows participants to join, trade with, and create a set of rules specific to their Trusted Circles, thereby ensuring each participant knows one another. The technology ensures regulation is met while guaranteeing transparency and decentralization.
Tgrade introduced a consensus mechanism that is a variation of Proof of Stake, called Proof of Engagement. Proof of Engagement addresses issues around the centralization of validators and incentivizes the entire community to collaborate, beyond existing, traditional rewards paid to node operators and core developers. As incentives are aligned for the whole community, this consensus mechanism promises the establishment of a stronger network than the conventional Proof of Stake mechanism.
Rebranding
The Advanced Blockchain team is currently working on finalizing an updated website, with a focus on providing in-depth information about the team, our vision, and our portfolio companies. The new website is expected to be live by early September 2022.
Leaner Organization
As announced earlier, Simon Telian has taken over from Michael Geike as CEO of Advanced Blockchain. To cut costs in preparation for the next growth period, a leaner organization and efficient workflows were established in June-August 2022. Under the management of the new Head of AB.Labs – Christopher Kraft – the first incubations of the new-look organization, such as Panoptic, are starting to fundraise and are in active conversation with leading VCs. Furthermore, the company will publish a half-yearly financial report as soon as possible.
Incubations & Investments:
Composable Finance
Composable Finance is currently preparing Picasso and Pablo for launch as they finalize audits and QA. Composable is also making steady progress within their bridging team for both Cosmos and NEAR Protocol and the XCVM demo and developer interface that will be shown at Cosmoverse in September.
Element Finance
Element Finance is currently working on wrapping up v2 audits in anticipation of the imminent Element v2 deployment that will directly integrate the functionality of Component Finance into the Element v2 interface.
Arweave
Six innovations were launched in the Arweave ecosystem in early August: Vouch Protocol (ANS-109), VouchDAO, Stamps, StampCoin, Programmably Exchangeable Tokens, and BurntAR. These innovations will bootstrap the web of value on the permaweb, eventuating in a web with natively exchangeable and monetizable content sans advertisements.
Alluo Finance
In late July 2022, Alluo Finance announced partnerships with Superfluid Finance and GravityX Capital and released a new version of their dApp. In August 2022, Alluo announced a partnership with Sheesha Finance.
Quasar Finance
In late July 2022, Quasar Finance raised just over $6 million in funding from leading VCs such as Polychain Capital, Blockchain Capital, Figment Capital, and Galileo Group. Since then, Quasar launched their first testnet – Questnet v1.
Contango
After having raised over $4 million in seeding funding in July 2022, Contango has been conducting extensive market research, such as reviewing the four principal designs for fixed-rate markets in DeFi, to incorporate the best mechanisms into their new-age DEX. Contango will soon finalize their upcoming integration with Notional Finance.
Maverick Protocol
Maverick Protocol will launch its third testnet in September 2022, with the mainnet launch scheduled for Q4 2022.
Component Finance
In early August 2022, Component Finance posted a grant proposal to the Element Finance DAO to build a fixed borrow protocol on top of DeFi money markets such as Compound Finance and Aave using Element Finance.
Instrumental Finance
Instrumental Finance is developing strategies within the Composable Finance ecosystem that will allow users to deposit EVM assets on the mainnet and earn yield from the Pablo DEX on Picasso. Instrumental will eventually evolve into a cross-chain yield optimizer. Through governance, the community may vote on future strategies.
Mekatek
In the next few weeks, Mekatek will have the tools and documentation ready to connect to their open builder API which facilitates block production between validators and searchers.
Neon Labs
The Neon DAO audit took place in August 2022 and the team is currently working on addressing the issues that were uncovered. The Neon EVM core platform too is undergoing a (security) audit at the time of writing. Neon EVM core platform stability testing and migration to Transactions V2 also took place, among other updates.
Peaq Network
Peaq Network recently rolled out the first version of Peaq Pay, one of three core functions powering Peaq, enabling transactions between people and machines in the Economy of Things on Polkadot.
Obol Network
Obol Network recently launched their first public testnet. The testnet witnessed 5,000+ signups, 200+ successful Distributed Key Generation (DKG) ceremonies, and 100+ Distributed Validator Clusters signing attestations across 40+ countries.
Manta Network
Manta Network published an article detailing their updated roadmap in August 2022, highlighting accomplishments such as the successful launch of the incentivized Dolphin Testnet v2, Q3 updates, and a deep dive into the future of Manta.
Pendulum Chain
Amplitude Chain, the Canary Network of Pendulum Chain, won parachain auction slot #42 on Kusama Network in early July, raising just over $1.1 million – as of August 2022, Amplitude is live on Kusama. Pendulum recently launched The Pendulums Grants Program to provide funding to like-minded projects that are building AMMs, lending protocols, stable fiat tokens, etc.
Fractal Protocol
Fractal Protocol partnered with Foxtopia in August 2022 for the latter’s launch. Fractal also partnered with MetaOpsGaming (by Open Portal Studios) for the launch of the first-ever MetaOpsLeague tournament in August 2022.
Panoptic
Panoptic is currently in the process of fundraising and is in conversation with leading VCs while actively working on its product.
FINPRO
FINPRO has been working on two groundbreaking NFT projects with well-known artists Tobias Rehberger and Anton Lubchenko. The first project by Tobias, titled “Fairytales & Conspiracies“, will entail the innovation of liquid posters that are being solidified into NFTs. The second project by Anton, titled “The Three Words”, will feature the condensation of the sentence, “I love you,” into the shortest triptych of classical chamber music ever made.
Tracebloc
No external updates have been published. Please visit the website for more information.
Stela Labs
Stela Labs will cover the audit of Contango. Furthermore, Stela Labs is performing internal audits and providing security support for Advanced Blockchain's portfolio companies.
Sigmadex (SDEX)
Sigmadex (SDEX) worked on two important focus areas in August 2022: the UI library for future efficiency and smart contract schematics. A release timeline will be communicated to followers of the project in due course.
Sentinel dVPN
As of August 2022, there are 4,700+ active nodes on the Sentinel dVPN network – an all-time high for the project, rivaling most centralized VPN providers.
zCloak Network
In August 2022, zCloak Network launched the zkID Credential Platform and zCloak Membership Credential Event.
Apricot Finance
Apricot Finance was recently featured in a case study by SolanaFM, detailing the evolution of DeFi protocols on Solana.
Talisman
As of August 2022, Talisman is available on Product Hunt. Talisman recently announced support for Nodle Network, Moonsama, Moonwell Finance, Sirius Finance, Moonbeam Network, Skybreach, Zenlink Network, Astar Network, MoonBeans, Orcus Finance, and Composable Finance.
Polymer Labs
Polymer Labs is currently working on building IBC clients beyond the Cosmos SDK stack, in the quest to realize a multi-chain vision. Along with projects such as Composable Finance and Octopus Network, Polymer Labs is a leader in this sphere.
NEAR Protocol
NEAR Protocol’s NEARCON 2022 will take place in Lisbon on September 11-14th, with 2,000+ attendees. Several prominent speakers have been recently announced for the event and tickets are available for purchase at the time of writing.
MOXY
In August 2022, MOXY revealed the platform live on Twitch. Recently CEO of MOXY, Matt deFouw, along with Chief Knowledge Officer, Nolan K Bushnell, and Lawrence Siegel, Executive Chairman, attended the gamescon 2022, in Cologne.
Fragcolor
Fragcolor was recently featured in the 2022 Game Developer Report by Game7.
Forest Park Group
Forest Park Group has not released any updates in August 2022.
MYSO Finance
Early in August, MYSO Finance wrapped up the MYSO Private Testnet, where users were able to test out some of the functionalities of zero-liquidation loans, powered by MYSO. MYSO published key statistics on Twitter and announced the raffle winners.
Mero Finance (Backd)
In late July, Backd rebranded to Mero Finance and was recently made open-source. In August 2022, Mero announced support for Frax Finance ($FRAX). Mero Phase II was launched as well in August, with the introduction of uncapped liquidity pools.
Warp Finance
On 8th August, Warp Finance launched the Warp v2 Beta platform and is currently working on support for additional Element Finance lending pairs on the v2 Beta platform, as well as full-featured v2 research, documentation, and development.
The Warp team also released a new-look biweekly magazine on 22nd August, detailing development updates, deep dives into the present and future of Warp, internal updates, and community involvement. Warp will launch a new monthly podcast starting on 5th September, that will serve as an educational hub for all things Warp.
For further information on Advanced Blockchain and our other projects and investments, please visit https://www.advancedblockchain.com/.
Thank you for reading!
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