Infrared Raises $16 Million To Launch First Liquidity Staking Protocol On Berachain

MARCH 4, 2025 — Infrared, the first Proof of Liquidity (PoL) staking protocol on Berachain, today announces their Series A raise of $14 million, led by Framework Ventures. A previous $2.25 million strategic round led by Binance Labs, Hack VC, and NLH was not disclosed, bringing the total to $16.25 million raised. Infrared’s protocol enables liquid staking solutions and rewards for Berachain’s native tokens, BGT and BERA, through Infrared’s iBGT and iBERA, while empowering efficient governance. Investors include Citizen X, Halo, NLH, NGC Ventures, Selini Capital, and more. These rounds follow a $2.5 million seed round from Synergis, Tribe Capital, Shima Capital, Dao5, Signum Capital, and others. Infrared has now raised a total of $18.75 million since being founded in 2024.

As the first project to be incubated by Berachain Foundation’s incubator, Build-a-Bera, Infrared’s iBGT and iBERA tokens allow users to earn a liquid – or accessible – version of Berachain’s native tokens while staking and still earning rewards. Infrared’s technology and product suite interacts with Berachain’s Proof of Liquidity (PoL) staking protocol. Berachain is a new blockchain that launched on February 6th, introducing PoL for the first time, with over two billion dollars of total value locked.

“As one of the lead investors in Berachain, we believe Infrared will play a major role in simplifying and increasing access to Proof of Liquidity for users in the Berachain community,” said Michael Anderson, Co-founder of Framework Ventures. “We believe Infrared’s protocol will unlock significant amounts of productive capital within the wider Berachain ecosystem, while maximizing efficiency and yield. This frees builders on Berachain’s framework to innovate in new ways.”

Berachain’s PoL changes traditional chain-app dynamics under Proof of Work (PoW) and Proof of Stake (PoS), giving app builders access to liquidity from the outset. Validators can also stake a token called BERA, which in turn allows them to direct block rewards of another token called BGT towards chosen applications. Berachain’s PoL enables the Berachain community to create financial incentives for apps to build atop of Berachain, allowing them to participate in the upside of the network.

BGT is normally nontransferrable, or “soul-bound” to a wallet address until it is irreversibly burned in exchange for BERA. With iBGT, users can earn a liquid, composable version of BGT, allowing them to maintain liquidity while still earning rewards. Similarly, iBERA allows users to stake their BERA tokens without locking them in validators, enabling them to earn Berachain staking yield without sacrificing liquidity.

"Infrared has built the infrastructure that will sit at the center of Berachain’s Proof of Liquidity economy,” said Raito, Co-founder of Infrared. “From novices of DeFi to experts, we are making it easy for builders and users of Berachain’s ecosystem to deploy their funds and earn sustainable yields. This funding further enables us to scale our vision, continue building innovative infrastructure, and support builders."

The founding team at Infrared has previous experience as core contributors to Berachain, as well as Apple, NASA, Kraken, and layer-2 scaling solution Optimism. The team plans to use raised funds to scale their vision, continue building innovative infrastructure, and support builders leveraging Proof of Liquidity.

Find out more about Infrared here: https://infrared.finance/

About Infrared

Infrared is the first suite of products built around Berachain’s Proof of Liquidity (PoL) mechanism. The protocol enables efficient value capture through liquid staking solutions for Berachain’s native tokens, BGT and BERA, node infrastructure, and PoL vaults. Infrared’s iBERA is a liquid staked token for BERA, earning validator staking rewards while remaining usable in DeFi. iBGT is the only liquid wrapper for the Berachain Governance Token (BGT), which allows users to earn higher BGT yield and dapps to build all new use cases on Berachain. By developing core solutions for PoL, Infrared enhances the user experience and fuels the growth of the Berachain ecosystem.

About Framework Ventures

Framework Ventures is a major VC firm in the crypto industry, known for its early investments in several multi-billion dollar protocols across the DeFi and web3 gaming industries. In 2022, the firm raised $400M for its third fund, and has since significantly expanded into additional maturing verticals like web3 gaming, real-world assets, and social crypto. To learn more visit: https://framework.ventures/.