The startup Merkle Manufactory, associated with the DeSoc application Farcaster, has been valued at $1 billion following an investment round led by Paradigm, according to sources cited by Bloomberg.
Based in Los Angeles, Merkle Manufactory was founded in 2020 by two former Coinbase executives—Varun Srinivasan, a former senior director, and Dan Romero, a former vice president.
The entrepreneurs declined to comment, promising to provide detailed information soon.
Merkle is developing two main products: the blockchain protocol Farcaster and Warpcast, an application built on top of Farcaster that resembles X.
In July 2022, Merkle raised $30 million from a16z Crypto and other investors, as reported by the agency.
In a Blockworks podcast, Romero explained that the impetus for creating Farcaster was the desire to “create a protocol that is not controlled by any individual, company, or country.” According to him, this condition is a “long-term equilibrium state for a global public platform.”
According to Dune Analytics, on March 31, the number of unique reactions on Farcaster reached 1.83 million.
At the time of writing, more than 278,800 addresses are connected to the protocol, and over 297,000 signatures have been executed.
The protocol’s popularity surged following the launch of Frames in January.
This functionality allowed developers to embed various interactive features directly into Farcaster messages, known as Casts. The new mechanics enabled the use of most protocol features without needing to sign transactions or follow external links.
Previously, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin highlighted Farcaster’s success as an alternative to X.
In February, the protocol added support for Solana, allowing users to verify addresses on the blockchain.