Key Takeaways
- • Ground, founded by Superstate co-founder Reid Cuming, closed a $3.6 million pre-seed round co-led by Bain Capital Crypto and ParaFi, with participation from Nascent, Robot Ventures, Chapter One, and Consonant Ventures.
- • The company offers an API platform enabling fintechs, neobanks, wealth managers, exchanges, and asset managers to embed onchain yield products without building proprietary blockchain infrastructure.
- • Financing was structured as a SAFE with token warrants; no valuation was disclosed, and no investors received board seats, observer positions, or advisory roles.
- • Ground's API routes client capital into onchain yield strategies based on specified risk and liquidity parameters, currently supporting crypto-native sources including lending protocols and structured products, with plans to add liquid staking tokens.
- • The funding validates institutional appetite for infrastructure connecting traditional fintech distribution channels to decentralized finance yield opportunities amid growing stablecoin and tokenization adoption.
Summary
Ground, a stealth-mode startup founded by Reid Cuming—previously a co-founder at Superstate—has raised $3.6 million in pre-seed funding to build infrastructure connecting traditional financial platforms to onchain yield products. The round, which commenced in September 2025 and closed the following month, was co-led by Bain Capital Crypto and ParaFi, two prominent institutional players in digital asset infrastructure. The deal also attracted participation from venture firms Nascent, Robot Ventures, Chapter One, and Consonant Ventures.
The financing was structured as a simple agreement for future equity (SAFE) with token warrants, a common instrument for early-stage crypto ventures seeking to defer valuation discussions. Ground did not disclose its post-money valuation, and the investor syndicate notably abstained from taking board seats, observer positions, or advisory roles—a structure that preserves founder control while signaling confidence in management's vision.
Ground's platform addresses a specific market gap: enabling financial services firms—including fintechs, neobanks, wealth managers, cryptocurrency exchanges, and asset managers—to integrate onchain yield products via API without constructing their own blockchain infrastructure. The API dynamically routes client capital into yield strategies calibrated to specified risk and liquidity parameters. Current yield sources span crypto-native channels, including decentralized lending protocols and structured products. The company plans to expand support to liquid staking tokens, broadening the opportunity set.
Cuming framed the opportunity around macroeconomic trends: as stablecoin adoption and tokenization accelerate both domestically and internationally, end users will demand more than transactional capabilities—they will seek to earn returns, build savings, and access investment vehicles. Ground positions itself as the middleware abstracting away technical complexity, allowing traditional financial platforms to compete in the emerging onchain yield ecosystem without substantial engineering overhead.
The capital raise underscores sustained institutional conviction in fintech-to-DeFi infrastructure, particularly solutions that democratize access to onchain yield strategies and bridge legacy financial distribution to decentralized credit markets.
The financing was structured as a simple agreement for future equity (SAFE) with token warrants, a common instrument for early-stage crypto ventures seeking to defer valuation discussions. Ground did not disclose its post-money valuation, and the investor syndicate notably abstained from taking board seats, observer positions, or advisory roles—a structure that preserves founder control while signaling confidence in management's vision.
Ground's platform addresses a specific market gap: enabling financial services firms—including fintechs, neobanks, wealth managers, cryptocurrency exchanges, and asset managers—to integrate onchain yield products via API without constructing their own blockchain infrastructure. The API dynamically routes client capital into yield strategies calibrated to specified risk and liquidity parameters. Current yield sources span crypto-native channels, including decentralized lending protocols and structured products. The company plans to expand support to liquid staking tokens, broadening the opportunity set.
Cuming framed the opportunity around macroeconomic trends: as stablecoin adoption and tokenization accelerate both domestically and internationally, end users will demand more than transactional capabilities—they will seek to earn returns, build savings, and access investment vehicles. Ground positions itself as the middleware abstracting away technical complexity, allowing traditional financial platforms to compete in the emerging onchain yield ecosystem without substantial engineering overhead.
The capital raise underscores sustained institutional conviction in fintech-to-DeFi infrastructure, particularly solutions that democratize access to onchain yield strategies and bridge legacy financial distribution to decentralized credit markets.
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