Infrared, the First Proof of Liquidity (PoL) Staking Protocol on Berachain, Raises $14M in Series A

Infrared, the first proof of liquidity (PoL) staking protocol on Berachain, has raised $14 million in a Series A round led by Framework Ventures.

Crypto liquidity protocol Infrared announced on Thursday the completion of a $14 million Series A funding round, bringing its total capital raised to date to $18.75 million.

The Series A investment was led by Framework Ventures, with participation from existing investors Binance Labs and 3M Ventures, as well as new investors including Jebrain and Figment.

Earlier this year, Binance Labs spearheaded a $2.25 million strategic funding installment, and in 2023, Infrared secured $2.5 million in a seed round.

Infrared, the first proof-of-liquidity (PoL) staking protocol on Berachain, is building liquid staking solutions for Berachain’s native BGT and BERA tokens.

Berachain, a layer-1 blockchain, launched its mainnet on February 6 and at the same time airdropped a token to ecosystem and exchange users. The network is designed to be an open and permissionless blockchain that uses a novel PoL consensus mechanism to reward users and protocols for providing liquidity.

In comparison to other coins that use a PoS (proof-of-stake) chain, Berachain aims to maximize the capital efficiency of its ecosystem by distributing rewards to protocols and users who are actively providing liquidity.

Infrared’s protocol will be used to create new liquid staked tokens, which will be used to generate an additional yield across other DeFi protocols.

Infrared is also the first project to benefit from the Berachain Foundation’s incubator, named ‘Build a Bera,’ which announced that it was seeking start-ups to work with in January.

“We believe Infrared’s protocol will unlock significant amounts of productive capital within the wider Berachain ecosystem, while maximizing efficiency and yield. This frees builders on Berchain’s framework to innovate in new ways,” said Framework Ventures co-founder Michael Anderson.

“We’re huge fans of the Bandwidth protocol that Infrared is building to create a triple-bottom-line impact by increasing capital productivity, powering new levels of innovation and being a positive force for good in the world.”

Infrared has already launched its liquid staking products for BGT and BERA, and the protocol is now live on Berachain. The protocol is expected to launch on other chains later this year.