According to Blockworks, two more protocols related to restaking have announced funding rounds this week, indicating venture investors' growing interest in EigenLayer's expanding ecosystem. Aligned Layer has secured a $20 million Series A funding round led by Hack VC, with participation from several smaller crypto-focused venture firms. The protocol plans to launch as an actively validated service (AVS) on EigenLayer. AVSs are products secured through EigenLayer's restaking, a method that allows staked ether to be utilized beyond securing Ethereum, thereby creating an additional layer of usage for the capital that ensures Ethereum's security.
AVSs can be any blockchain-related protocol or service. The few that are already live on EigenLayer's mainnet include data availability, rollup creation, and oracle data. However, these AVSs have struggled to generate profits as EigenLayer has not yet enabled in-protocol payments. Aligned Layer is an EigenLayer-secured protocol for verifying zero-knowledge proofs, cryptographic proofs that validate a statement's truth without revealing the statement's content. Aligned Layer aims to reduce the cost of verifying zero-knowledge proofs.
In other funding news, Othentic announced $4 million in seed funding led by Finality and Breyer Capital. Othentic provides a software stack that assists AVS developers in creating a distributed system based on EigenLayer's shared security model. According to Nader Dabit, the director of developer relations at Eigen Labs, Othentic 'simplifies AVS development on EigenLayer with pre-built components, reduced engineering overhead, and a faster time to market.'
This week's largest fundraise was secured by Movement Labs, which raised a $38 million Series A led by Polychain. Movement Labs is launching a layer-2 named Movement, which utilizes the Move software stack developed by Facebook as part of its unsuccessful blockchain initiative. The programming language Move is currently used by layer-1 blockchains Aptos and Sui. Movement will be Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatible, meaning programs written for Ethereum can be deployed on the layer-2. Interestingly, Movement Labs is run by young founders aged 21 and 24.