The startup formerly known as Nebulous has raised a $3 million funding round led by Paradigm with participation from Bain Capital Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners, A.Capital, Collaborative Fund, Dragonfly Capital Partners, Hack VC, INBlockchain, First Star Ventures and others.
The startup also rebranded, as Skynet Labs, to focus on promoting the namesake application hosting platform, which uses the token-fueled Sia network.
- Launched in 2014, the Boston-based firm has a staff of 11 and has raised over $9 million to date.
- CEO David Vorick said there are more than 100 applications and 10 web portals already using Skynet as a decentralized storage alternative, including the popular exchange Uniswap. Skynet launched in February 2020.
- “It’s just another means of accessing Uniswap, if Infura goes down people can still access the interface,” Vorick said, referencing Ethereum-friendly infrastructure options. “This offers the ability for anyone to run their own portal and get full trustless access to the network. If we turn off all our infrastructure tomorrow, Skynet still exists.”
- Paradigm partner Dan Robinson said in a press statement he’s keen to see decentralized storage lead to social networking without distinct silos, like YouTube and Twitter, adding, “The project has enabled a growing ecosystem of builders to quickly prototype censorship-resistant applications and interactive websites.”
- In reference to the Skynet app store that popped up following rumors that TikTok might get delisted from popular app stores, Vorick said, “This is a third-party app that comes from the community. … Quick responses to things like TikTok being banned don’t need to ask us for permission.”
- This rebrand comes nearly one year after the startup reached a $225,000 settlement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for an unregistered token sale in 2014. Skynet users now rely on Siacoin tokens if they run a full Sia node.