Paradigm Leads $7M Round for Optimism-Based Startup Conduit

Crypto infrastructure startup Conduit has emerged from stealth with a $7 million seed funding round led by blockchain-focused investment giant Paradigm.

The new capital will help Conduit continue its first product launch and toward its goal of achieving profitability, Conduit founder Andrew Huang told CoinDesk in an interview.

Paradigm is one of the titans of the crypto venture capital industry, raising a then-record $2.5 billion for a new fund during the tail end of the bear market in Nov. 2021, which has since been topped by Andreessen Horowitz. Conduit has close ties to Paradigm – Andrew Huang is the brother of Paradigm co-founder and managing partner Matt Huang, who recused himself from the investment process. Andrew Huang also spent eight weeks as an entrepreneur in residence at the firm.

Conduit’s first product was created in conjunction with Optimism (OP), a layer 2 blockchain network that offers optimistic rollups - a way of bundling transactions to reduce fees and traffic congestion while maintaining the underlying security of Ethereum. Conduit offers a managed service that helps developers easily and quickly deploy their applications to Optimism. Conduit and the Optimism Foundation will work together to support developers launching apps on the chain and transition to its forthcoming Superchain blockchain network.

Conduit’s target customers includes decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, game companies and non-fungible token (NFt) platforms, to name a few. Teams that launch rollups with Conduit are eligible to earn a share of certain fees and financial rewards.

Read more: What Is Optimism?