Crypto Startup Kiln Raises $17.6m to Expand Staking

Kiln, an Ethereum staking-as-a-service startup, announced the closure of its Series A funding round on Monday, raising €17 million ($17.6 million). It will utilize the proceeds to broaden the current staking Staking Staking is defined as the process of holding funds in a cryptocurrency wallet to support the operations of a blockchain network. In particular, staking represents a bid to secure a volume of crypto to receive rewards. In most case however, this process relies on users participating in blockchain-related activities via a personal crypto wallet.The concept of staking is also closely tied to the Proof-of-Stake (PoS). PoS is a type of consensus algorithm in which a blockchain network aims to achieve Staking is defined as the process of holding funds in a cryptocurrency wallet to support the operations of a blockchain network. In particular, staking represents a bid to secure a volume of crypto to receive rewards. In most case however, this process relies on users participating in blockchain-related activities via a personal crypto wallet.The concept of staking is also closely tied to the Proof-of-Stake (PoS). PoS is a type of consensus algorithm in which a blockchain network aims to achieve Read this Term product range and infrastructure.

The newest financing round was led by Illuminate Financial with the participation of many cryptos investing entities, including Kraken Ventures, ConsenSys, XBTO and current investors, including 3KVC, SV Angel or Blue Yard Capital.

According to the press release, Kiln is currently holding over $500 million of assets staked under management. The company predicts that the staking demand will dynamically spread in the ecosystem after the Ethereum blockchain moves to a Proof of Stake (PoS).

At this time, only 12.5% of the available ETH supply is staked, whereas the figure for other PoS assets reaches 50-80%. If half of the available Ethereum tokens are staked, the value of this market will exceed $70 billion. Since the 'Merge', Ethereum offers an attractive annualized return of 6-7%.

"I am thrilled to close a robust funding round with such respected investors in the crypto space which will enable us to build out the next generation market standard in staking technology. At Kiln, we believe it is critical to provide enterprise-grade infrastructure to institutional users, that in turn enables our customers to create new opportunities for their users. We thank our existing and new investors for their partnership," Laszlo Szabo, the Co-Founder and CEO at Kiln, said.

"The Kiln team could not be more excited about this next stage of building out a world-class staking stack."

Staking Industry Must Become Institutionalized

The enterprise-grade staking technology provider Technology Provider A technology provider is an individual, company, or entity that creates, render services and sells software applications or hardware. Currently, there are four types of tech providers which are as followed:Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) – Functioning as a subscription-based licensing and delivery model, SaaS is centrally hosted and may also be referred to as on-demand software. Tech Hardware – Powerful tech providers such as Apple, Oculus Rift, FitBit, and Samsung are examples of tech hardware pro A technology provider is an individual, company, or entity that creates, render services and sells software applications or hardware. Currently, there are four types of tech providers which are as followed:Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) – Functioning as a subscription-based licensing and delivery model, SaaS is centrally hosted and may also be referred to as on-demand software. Tech Hardware – Powerful tech providers such as Apple, Oculus Rift, FitBit, and Samsung are examples of tech hardware pro Read this Term believes that the staking industry is becoming more institutionalized. As a result, it needs to move beyond validators activity, providing customers with greater security and better risk management.

For Kiln, this means creating special APIs and using independent validators to enable staking with multiple providers. It will allow cryptocurrencies to be staked regardless of where they are stored: on exchanges or in secure self-custody wallets.

"As the industry evolves and the need to integrate multiple staking players proves real, Kiln is in an ideal position to play the aggregator role and accelerate it," the company stated.

Presently, Kiln offers a range of solutions for the staking industry, including four proprietary services: Kiln Connect, Kiln On-Chain, Kiln Dashboard and Kiln Validators.