Bitcoin-Backed Stablecoin Developer Bima Labs Raises $2.25 Million in Seed Round
Developer Bima Labs Bitcoin 
Bitcoin
+5.11%
Supported stablecoin USBD has emerged, raising $2.25 million in a seed funding round.
Portal Ventures led the round, with participation from Draper Goren Blockchain, Sats Ventures, Luxor Technology, CoreDAO, and Halo Capital, Bima Labs said Monday. Angel investors including Ryan Fang of Ankr, Brian Crain of Chorus One, Jeffrey Feng of Sei Labs, and Smokey of Berachain also participated in the round.
Bima was founded in April and began raising funds, closing the round within three months, founder and CEO Siddarth Sridhar told The Block. Sridhar said the round consisted of equity with token warrants. He declined to comment on the valuation.
What is Bima Labs?
Bima has developed USBD, a Bitcoin-based stablecoin that can be minted using Bitcoin liquidity staking and re-staking tokens as collateral. Bima has stated that it will allow collateralization of multiple blockchains, including Bitcoin, Bitcoin Scaling Network, etc. Ethereum 
Ethereum
+5.98%
Virtual Machine (EVM) compatible network and Solana.
“Users can mint USBDs by depositing Bitcoin Liquid Staking Tokens (LST) and Liquid Re-Staking Tokens (LRT) from various providers, including Lorenzo, Lombard, pStake, Bedrock, Acre, DLC.link, ALEX Labs BTC, etc,” Sridhar said.
The issued USBD stablecoin can be used for lending, borrowing, exchange, and other purposes in decentralized finance applications to earn more rewards.
“We envision a world of new credit, debt and hybrid use cases based on USBD, whether in China, the US, Brazil or Europe,” Sridhar said.
USBD Mainnet Launch
USBD is currently live on testnet. Sridhar said the mainnet launch will happen in Q4 of this year. Bima will also launch its own governance token, BIMA, around the same time, Sridhar added. The BIMA token will be issued on an EVM-compatible chain that has not yet been determined, Sridhar said.
As The Block recently reported, Bima joins more than a dozen projects in the Bitcoin ecosystem that have raised venture capital funding this year. Sridhar said Bima was initially developing a stablecoin for the Ethereum ecosystem based on EigenLayer’s restaking protocol, but decided to switch to Bitcoin.
“What was accomplished in Ethereum in four to five years is being accomplished in Bitcoin in four to five months,” Sridhar said. “The Bitcoin ecosystem has a higher total addressable market, higher asset utilization in regions like Latin America and the Middle East and North Africa, and ultimately, the potential to unlock higher yield opportunities.”
Bima plans to use the new funding to grow its team to six people by hiring for various positions including business development and engineering, Sridhar said.
Get the latest crypto funding news and trends in our bimonthly newsletter, The Funding. It’s free. Sign up here!
Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet providing news, research and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is the largest investor in The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the cryptocurrency space. Cryptocurrency exchange Bitget is an anchor LP of Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to provide objective, impactful and timely information on the cryptocurrency industry. Below are the current financial disclosures.
© 2023 The Block. All rights reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not provided or intended to be legal, tax, investment, financial or other advice.
