Beacon, the Web3 accelerator helmed by founders from Polygon, celebrated its first Demo Day today.

New York City, New York, January 12, 2023, Chainwire

Beacon, an early-stage Web3 accelerator, held its inaugural Demo Day, presenting 13 innovative projects to a live audience of over 300 leading venture capitalists. 

Beacon This accelerator, known for being exceptionally supportive to founders and established by Sandeep Nailwal—who is a recognized figure in the Web3 space—hosted its first Demo Day today. Participants from Beacon's initial cohort pitched a variety of projects targeting different niches within the crypto-economy, covering areas like gaming, infrastructure, decentralized finance, and developer resources. This initial group, dubbed Cohort 0, was hailed as 'the MVP of Beacon' by Sandeep Nailwal, co-founder of Polygon. Looking ahead, he intends to expand the initiative by introducing two new cohorts each year that will accommodate 20 to 25 startups.

The three-month accelerator program The program will run twice a year—once in spring and again in fall. Nailwal estimates that the acceptance rate for Cohort 1 will mirror the previous cohort's low rate of just 1%. Spanning twelve weeks, it offers founders the opportunity to hear from industry leaders in Web3 and gain personalized guidance from Beacon’s core team. application The deadline for applications to Cohort 1 is set for January 31, with activities scheduled to commence in April. Each startup selected for this forthcoming round will receive a guaranteed investment of $250,000, with each company entering the program being valued at $8 million post-money.

In addition to involvement from notable investors such as Sequoia, Lightspeed, Electric, and Accel, the Beacon program boasts a diverse group of mentors including Magic Eden CEO Jack Lu, Anagram Co-Founder Lily Liu, Halborn co-founder Rob Behnke, YGG Co-Founder Beryl Li, and Brendan Farmer, co-lead at Polygon Zero, among various others.

Beyond managing its accelerator, Beacon has developed proprietary software referred to as Lighthouse , designed to facilitate connections between founders and investors. Lighthouse serves as a unique platform where potential backers can evaluate projects and network, while also allowing founders to discover tailored vendor deals and assess job candidates for their companies. here .

Demo Day provided an invaluable stage for Cohort 0, which had participated in the accelerator's remote-first program over 12 weeks in the last quarter of 2022, enabling them to pitch their projects to an audience of over 300 influential investors in the Web3 sector. Many teams within Cohort 0 focused on pioneering cross-chain solutions.

Reflecting on the perseverance and determination of the Cohort 0 founders, Nailwal commented, 'I have been incredibly inspired by the commitment and hard work of the founders in this group. Despite facing significant market challenges during the program, they showed remarkable resilience and dedication to pushing through these tough times. I firmly believe that the individuals from Cohort 0 are destined for success.' build the next unicorns in web3.”

Cohort 0 consists of 15 companies that were meticulously chosen from a pool of over 1,000 applicants, with 13 graduating on Demo Day. This talented group includes 29 founders from nine different countries and 13 cities. Most projects are at the seed funding stage, with the exception of one eSports platform that is currently in its Series A round. Community Gaming The complete roster of companies that successfully graduated from Cohort 0 is listed below:

What it offers: A comprehensive Web3 toolkit aimed at developers.

Company name: Arcana

Founders: Mayur Relekar, Aravindh Kumar.

The pitch: Arcana seeks to enhance the technological framework for developers by providing essential tools for building secure decentralized applications (dApps), including user authentication, data storage on its

Stage: Seed

and access control. The platform aspires to enable developers across 'almost any chain' to utilize its offerings and resources. decentralized network Founders: Hugh Behroozy, Hajeir Mazinani.

Company name: Blinkmoon

What it does: Game development studio

The pitch: Blinkmoon is in the process of establishing an independent studio dedicated to the burgeoning Web3 sector. The team's past experience includes contributions to major productions for 'Guardians of the Galaxy' and 'Game of Thrones,' as well as working on beloved gaming franchises like League of Legends: Wild Rift, NBA, Dead Rising, and Rainbow Six.

Stage: Seed

The pitch: ChapterX is an innovative Web3 event experience platform that empowers organizers to elevate their events into unforgettable engagements. It offers features to captivate attendees through both in-person events and customizable virtual realms within the metaverse, integrating elements like gaming development decentralized autonomous organization. create the visuals Participants can also transform their 2D NFTs into 3D avatars

Company name: ChapterX

What it does: Web3 event experience

Founders: Chase Guo

Stage: Seed

using its re-skinning system, exploring new worlds and integrating into communities through its expansive network. This ecosystem aims to bridge Web 2.0 games with the Web3 landscape, focusing on fantasy-driven content. Its foundational system, Colexion Core, comprises various (DAO) governance or GameFi. marketplaces, bridges, wallets, and additional services designed to assist traditional gaming projects in transitioning to the Web3 format. The company concentrates on the Asia-Pacific region and operates in over 10 countries, according to their website. Notably, Colexion has gained backing from Polygon, Brevan Howard, Jump Capital, Symbolic Capital, Firestarter, and GSR. Gaming aspires to be a comprehensive platform for esports competition, delivering crucial infrastructure to stakeholders in the industry. The platform leverages Ethereum- and Solana-integrated blockchain payment systems, equipping players, organizers, and developers with the tools necessary for creating, managing, and participating in esports tournaments. Users can also monetize their gameplay through quest completions and daily content.

Company name: Colexion

What it does: GameFi ecosystem

Founders: Abhay Aggarwal

Stage: Seed

The pitch: Colexion is a card-based GameFi What it provides: A suite of tools and infrastructure for Web3 developers. services like minting Founders: Ann Stefan, Deian Stefan, Riad Wahby, Fraser Brown. million active users The pitch: Cubist specializes in developer tools and infrastructure, aiming to integrate contemporary software engineering methodologies.

Company name: Community Gaming

What it does: Esports platform

Founders: Chris Gonsalves

Stage: Series A

The pitch: Community Their toolkit focuses on offering safer, more secure alternatives, enabling developers to build, test, and implement easily across multi-chain and cross-chain dApps. The founding team includes a former COO of a fintech firm and computer science scholars from and UC San Diego. The team brings extensive experience in fortifying security measures for real-world applications, collectively boasting over 80 published research papers on topics related to computer systems, programming languages, security protocols, and cryptography. engine for earnings and game discovery.

Company name: Cubist

What it enables: MEV solutions tailored for Ethereum-driven blockchains and rollups.

The pitch: The FastLane protocol strives to enhance revenue generation for validators, optimize efficiency for algorithmic traders, and alleviate the burden on network participants overwhelmed by redundant transactions, all without requiring participants to manage or install custom software on their validating nodes. The protocol's ultimate goal is to minimize transaction spam while bolstering the overall health of the Ethereum network by capitalizing on propagation bottlenecks within the layer-2 Polygon blockchain and redistributing the profits to the validators involved.

Stage: Seed

The pitch: Meta Apes is a free-to-play, win-to-earn security to web3 game developed on the BNB Application Sidechain (BAS). Players can construct their own cities and communities while competing against others in a quest for dominance in the 'race to space.' The game aims to fuse conventional gaming mechanics, such as massively multiplayer online (MMO) playstyles, with Web3 elements like in-game currencies. The development team has experience at notable companies such as Ubisoft, Gameloft, Zynga, AppLovin, and Epic. Carnegie Mellon University This gaming studio and publisher, founded by veterans from Activision, LucasArts, and Electronic Arts, has launched its inaugural game, Planet Mojo, which is built on

Company name: FastLane Labs

Sumatra and serves as a browser-based hub for interconnected games. Its auto chess title, Mojo Melee, is currently undergoing alpha testing with plans for a full launch in the first quarter of this year on web browsers and mobile devices. The studio's backers include

Founders: Alex Watts, Jordan Hagan

Stage: Seed

, Republic Crypto, and Polygon Studios, among others.

Company name: Meta Apes

What it does: Web3 game

Founders: Taylor Shim, Nicholas Carr

Stage: Seed

Founders: Alex Page, Andrew Yeoh, Andrew Masanto. mobile web3 game The pitch: Nillion is a Web3 infrastructure initiative that concentrates on the security of data storage, computational processes, and fragmentation across the internet. 'Nillion represents a significant technological infrastructure endeavor,' noted Andrew Yeoh, the firm's founding chief marketing officer, in a prior interview with TechCrunch. 'While blockchains handle certain aspects,'

Company name: Mystic Moose

What it does: Web3 gaming developer

Founders: Mike Levine

Stage: Seed

The pitch: Mystic Moose is a web3 platform 's objective is to decentralize every other element concerning data.' The founding team features former employees from Uber, Indiegogo, and Hedera Hashgraph, alongside executives from Coinbase and Nike. The top of its scalable backend platform in December 2022 secured funding from over 150 investors, a strategic move to avoid concentrated ownership, as highlighted by Nillion CEO Alex Page in a statement. backed by Animoca Brands Founders: Varun Satyam, Julian Hayward, Filipe Gonçalves.

Company name: Nillion

What it does: Web3 infrastructure

The pitch: Davos Protocol is the home of DAVOS, its stable asset, which maintains balance through a monetary policy that aligns yield generation with price stability weekly, utilizing liquid staking methods, as stated on its website. Users have the option to borrow DAVOS using liquid staking tokens as collateral. Additionally, they can provide pairs of stable assets to

Stage: Seed

engage in yield farming and earn various rewards. The team is dedicated to elevating decentralize finance blockchain technology to mainstream usage company raised more than $20 million by incentivizing both borrowers and stakers via this innovative protocol. Notable partners include Polygon and Ankr.

Company name: Davos Protocol

What it does: Stable asset lending protocol

What it offers: A decentralized framework for lending and borrowing.

Stage: Seed

Founders: Ameeth Devadas, Harshita Singh, Ricsson Ngo. provide liquidity The pitch: Timeswap is a decentralized finance platform that facilitates lending and borrowing for users through an automated Beacon, an accelerator championed by the founders of Polygon, proudly marked its first Demo Day in the Web3 space. On January 12, 2023, in the vibrant city of New York, Chainwire reported that early-stage accelerator Beacon showcased 13 innovative projects during its inaugural Demo Day.

Company name: Timeswap

In a groundbreaking event, Beacon, the Web3 accelerator led by the founder of Polygon, celebrated its first Demo Day.

The FTC's attempt to prevent the merger between Microsoft and Activision was unsuccessful as their appeal was rejected.

Stage: Seed

Originally published on January 12, 2023, at 11:07 AM, and updated on May 31, 2024, at 9:15 AM market maker To enhance your experience in your local language, we sometimes utilize an automatic translation tool. Keep in mind, automatic translations may not always be precise, so please read carefully.

Company name: Ylide

New York City, New York, January 12, 2023, Chainwire

Beacon, an emerging web3 accelerator, conducted its first Demo Day of the year where 13 startups pitched their projects to an audience of over 300 elite venture capitalists. 

Stage: Seed

Sandeep Nailwal, an accomplished builder in the web3 landscape, initiated this founder-friendly accelerator. Today, the inaugural Demo Day took place where participants from Beacon’s initial cohort presented their innovative concepts across various sectors of the crypto ecosystem including gaming, infrastructure, decentralized finance, and developer tools. Cohort 0, hailed as “the MVP of Beacon” by core contributor Sandeep Nailwal, the co-founder of Polygon blockchain, aims to expand significantly by hosting two cohorts per year, each comprising 20 to 25 startups. smart contracts The accelerator operates twice a year, in spring and autumn, with expectations that Cohort 1 will reflect a tough 1% acceptance rate similar to its precursor. The program spans twelve weeks, during which selected founders engage in weekly sessions with top-tier builders in the web3 space and receive ongoing mentorship from Beacon’s main contributors.

About Beacon

Beacon is an early-stage The application deadline for Cohort 1 is set for January 31, with the next cycle starting in April. Each startup selected for this new program will receive a standard investment of $250,000, attributing an $8 million post-money valuation to each participating company. In addition to prominent investors such as Sequoia, Lightspeed, Electric, and Accel, the Beacon program features a remarkable lineup of mentors, including: program supports web3 founders CEOs like Jack Lu, along with Anagram’s co-founder Lily Liu, Halborn’s Rob Behnke, YGG's co-founder Beryl Li, and Brendan Farmer from Polygon Zero, among several others.

Beyond its accelerator initiatives, Beacon has developed an in-house software platform known as Lighthouse.Airdrops Calendar .

Learn more here: https://www.0xbeacon.com/

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