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Binance Labs has recently made an undisclosed investment in the Bitcoin staking protocol called Babylon.
In addition, in recent weeks, Binance Labs has extended its investments to Renzo and Puffer Finance, liquid restaking protocols on Ethereum. Let’s see all the details below.
Summary
Binance Labs supports Babylon in the Bitcoin staking sector
As anticipated, Binance Labs, the incubation and venture capital arm of the cryptocurrency platform Binance, recently made an investment in Babylon, a staking protocol for Bitcoin.
Therefore, Binance Labs’ interest in startups operating in the staking and restaking sectors is once again evident with this investment.
The exact amount of investment from Binance Labs has not been disclosed. However, Babylon’s co-founder, David Tse, confirmed that it follows the same structure as Babylon’s seed and Series A rounds.
These rounds have seen a collection of $18 million in Series A in December 2023 and $8.8 million in seed in 2022.
In recent times, Binance Labs has focused its efforts on supporting startups active in the staking and restaking sectors.
Recently, it also invested in Renzo and Puffer Finance, quickly positioning them as the second and fourth most liquid restaking protocols on Ethereum, according to DeFiLlama data.
Furthermore, Binance Labs’ investment in Babylon coincides with the imminent launch of the protocol’s test network this week, as confirmed by Tse.
Babylon: some information about it
Babylon, a staking protocol for Bitcoin, offers BTC holders the opportunity to stake their coins on proof-of-stake blockchains, opening up new scenarios for earning rewards.
This revolutionary protocol aims to transform BTC into a staking asset, improving the security of PoS chains by leveraging the robustness of Bitcoin.
Babylon, already active in the Cosmos Hub ecosystem, is paving the way for new crucial use cases in the industry, marking a significant integration of Bitcoin into the Proof-of-Stake economy.
Yi He, co-founder of Binance and head of Binance Labs, states the following:
“Bitcoin staking introduces a new crucial use case for the sector, marking a significant step in the integration of Bitcoin with the Proof-of-Stake economy.”
Binance Labs’ investment in Babylon demonstrates the commitment to supporting innovative projects that contribute to the progress of Bitcoin and expand its use cases.
The Babylon PoS chain, built with the Cosmos SDK, will be the first to be protected by this protocol.
I am learning about the possibility of creating a market where BTC holders can migrate to other PoS networks through Babylon.
With the financial support of Binance Labs, Babylon plans to expand its team of developers and aims to launch the phase one of the mainnet by the end of the year.
Binance Labs’ investment in Renzo
As mentioned, Binance Labs has recently made an investment in Renzo, a Liquid Restaking Token (LRT) and Strategy Manager designed to promote the widespread adoption of EigenLayer.
Renzo’s mission is to develop shared security on EigenLayer and establish a standard for risk management in restaking.
The Renzo protocol, known as EigenLayer’s Restaking Hub, uses Ethereum smart contracts to facilitate trustless collaboration between stakers, node operators, and actively validated services (AVS).
These contracts simplify the process, allowing users to reclaim their resources, delegate them to node operators, and interact with service modules on the chain.
Renzo acts as an interface for the EigenLayer ecosystem, offering higher performance compared to Ethereum (ETH) staking and ensuring AVS.
The protocol collaborates with operators of institutional nodes to offer native ETH restaking, supporting native ETH deposits and LST tokens such as stETH and wBETH.
Every deposit on Renzo, both in LST and in ETH, generates an equivalent in ezETH, a liquid restaking token that represents the user’s restaking position.
Renzo is also working with bridging partners to enable cross-chain bridging of ETH from other Layer 1 (L1) and Layer 2 (L2) directly on EigenLayer, simplifying the process for users across different chains.
The protocol is at the forefront in redefining risk management and portfolio, collaborating with institutional node operators and involving researchers DeFi.
With a team composed of DeFi native founders, Renzo is committed to offering new values and features through the innovation of LRT products.
Specifically, focusing on risk management and security, applying the current best practices of DeFi to EigenLayer.