🦄Web3 Startups and VCs – Telegram
🦄Web3 Startups and VCs
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Learn about best Web3 and crypto startups and venture capital deals. Startup reviews, fundraising tips, crypto market insights & data for Web3 enthusiasts and professionals on https://innmind.com/
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📘 Web3 Grants in 2025 Are Tough. Here’s How to Navigate Them

Grant programs tightened their rules this year. Forms got longer, requirements got stricter, and most founders waste days applying to grants that are already outdated or irrelevant.

Here’s what actually matters now:

🔹 Relevance beats volume
Apply only where your product clearly fits the ecosystem.

🔹 Cold forms rarely work
Warm intros and community presence drastically increase your chances.

🔹 Documentation is key
A clean deck, milestones and a transparent budget speak louder than promises.

🔹 Avoid grant hopping
Switching chains every quarter kills focus and builds tech debt fast.

We summarised all practical tactics, founder mistakes and ecosystem tips in one guide.
👉 Read the full article

Execute smart and keep moving forward.
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🌓 The Real State of Web3 Grants in 2025

Grant applications today feel like a full time job. Milestones, reports and long forms replaced the easy 2021 days and too many founders get ghosted after doing all the work.

Our video breaks down the real problems and what actually works:

🔹 Grant hopping drains teams
Rebuilding for every new chain kills momentum.

🔹 Inner circle bias exists
If you’re not active in the ecosystem, your form often disappears.

🔹 Traction wins
Even small real usage matters more than any pitch deck.

🔹 Strategy matters
Choose one ecosystem, get warm intros and treat guidelines seriously.

The video explains all of this with real founder stories and sharp takeaways.
👉 Watch here

Stay focused founders. Smart strategy beats grind.
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4️⃣ Critical Tokenomics Metrics Every Founder Should Model Before Fundraising

In 2025, investors evaluate tokenised projects very differently from previous cycles.

They don’t care about “big supply” or “cheap token price”. They care about fundamentals that show whether your token can survive unlocks and real market behaviour.

Here are the four metrics that matter most:

▪️ Distribution & Vesting: how balanced the early allocations are and when each cohort unlocks
▪️ FDV/MC Ratio: whether the project is structurally overvalued at listing
▪️ Token Velocity: whether users hold or immediately sell the token
▪️ Network Usage: whether real product activity creates actual token demand

If these four are not modelled clearly, founders end up negotiating from a weak position — and investors walk away.

Get the detailed explanations and examples from real Web3 use cases inside the article.
👉 Creating Successful Tokenomics in 2025: Key Metrics to Consider
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The New Visibility Layer for Web3 Projects 🌟

In Web3, you are not only building tech. You are competing for visibility. SEO, AEO and GEO form a powerful funnel that works 24/7. SEO builds trust, AEO wins the answer box, and GEO gets your project inside AI search results like ChatGPT and Perplexity.

One of our latest articles breaks down why classic SEO fails in Web3: people no longer search. They ask AI and expect a direct answer.

For founders, this means one thing:
📥 Engine Optimisation puts your startup inside the conversations users and investors already have with AI tools.

Visibility is not luck anymore. It is an infrastructure choice⚡️

💬 Founders & marketers — quick question: tried AI optimization already?

👉 Share your experience in the comments — what worked, what didn’t?
Let’s learn from each other. 🚀
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🙈 Don’t Design Tokenomics Blindly in 2025

Too many founders still build tokenomics on “gut feeling” instead of real metrics. The result is predictable: sell pressure at every unlock, broken FDV/MC math, and price collapsing before the product even gains traction.

If you're working on tokenomics, make sure you understand how distribution, velocity, liquidity depth, buyback logic and network usage interact. This new article breaks down the fundamentals every Web3 founder must control in 2025 — in a way that actually maps to investor due diligence.

Here is what the article helps you clarify:
▪️ how your vesting schedule affects sell pressure
▪️ why FDV/MC misalignment kills listings
▪️ how to model unlock scenarios and real demand
▪️ what “healthy” token velocity looks like
▪️ when burn or buyback makes sense economically

And once you understand the logic behind these metrics, there is a tool that helps you calculate everything without guesswork: the Tokenomics Calculator Template PRO (2025 Edition).

It’s the same model used by 200+ funded startups to build investor-ready tokenomics, complete with automated dashboards, liquidity modelling, valuation logic and cohort-based sell pressure simulations.

The article gives you the framework. The calculator helps you apply it with precision.

👉 Read the full breakdown: Creating Successful Tokenomics in 2025: Key Metrics to Consider
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🍫 Saturday Tokenomics Snack: The Only Metric Founders Forget

Most tokenomics fail not because of hype, supply numbers or narrative. They fail because founders ignore how fast their token moves.

➡️ High token velocity = constant sell pressure = no price stability.
➡️ Low velocity = healthy holding incentives and real demand.

If your tokenomics doesn’t control velocity, unlocks will control your price. And they don’t play nice.

The new article breaks down the essentials you should keep an eye on (in the simplest way possible 😊).

👉 Read the guide: Creating Successful Tokenomics in 2025
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🚨 1M followers ≠ real users. Here’s a better way.

If you’re a Web3 / crypto / AI founder, you already know this pain:

- KOLs bring bots & farmers;
- Quests generate empty metrics;
- “Top crypto channels” → 0 real users;
- Huge spend → 0 compounding effect…

We recently talked to a project with 1M+ followers on X.
1 month after token launch:
- price down 67% vs sale
- runway almost gone
- <300 real paying users in the dApp

That’s what “marketing for hype” looks like.

There is an alternative.

Instead of renting attention from KOLs, some teams now build their own AI influencer.

Not a bot + Not ads + Not quests.

A hyper-realistic AI creator that:
- tracks viral trends in your niche
- produces short-form video content daily
- grows organic followers from scratch
- converts them into community members, early users & token holders.

Real cases:
→ From 0 to 70k organic followers
→ millions of views in 2-3 months
→ no paid traffic, airdrops or KOLs

Why this is interesting now

- works while you build product
- cheaper than KOL budgets
- creates owned audience
- some founders already get inbound promo requests

InnMind Special Deal:

Standard agency pricing: $2,000 / month

For InnMind founders: $1,300 / month (lifetime discounted rate)

⚠️ Only 10 projects accepted

No public website.
No mass sales.
Direct intro only.

👉 Book a call with the AI influencers team NOW:
https://calendly.com/elizabeth-louns-ai-content/45min

Tip: mention you’re coming from InnMind to lock the discounted lifetime rate.
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🚀 Demo Day Recap — what a session!

We hosted an online Demo Day with Easy MM where Web3 startups pitched their projects directly to investors — and the energy was on point ⚡️

Quick highlights:
• 8 warm investor intros
• 400+ live views
• 40+ startup applications
• Plenty of strong new connections made 🤝

Huge thanks to all founders, investors, and partners who joined us and made this session valuable and dynamic.

👀 Stay tuned — we’ll be announcing the next pitching session soon.
If you’re building in Web3 and want to pitch your startup to investors, make sure you don’t miss the next application window.

More to come 🚀
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150 DePIN Investors. Zero Guesswork. Ready to Use 📥

Fundraising for a DePIN startup should not mean weeks of messy spreadsheets, outdated blog lists, and cold Googling partners who never invested in infrastructure.

We just added a powerful new document to the InnMind Knowledge Base:
▶️ DePIN Investor Database 2026 updated December 2025

This is a clean, action-ready Google Sheet with 150+ verified DePIN-focused investors who actually back compute, GPU networks, connectivity, IoT, mapping, storage, energy, and real-world infrastructure.

What makes this different is execution speed.
▪️ You get real decision-makers, not info@ emails.
▪️ You see real DePIN bets, not vague “Web3 interest”.
▪️ You get direct outreach paths and source links to validate fit fast.

Instead of building a list from scratch, you can filter by your sub-vertical, shortlist 30–50 investors, personalise your message, and start outreach the same day.

You can spend weeks recreating this yourself. Or save that time and start fundraising smarter today.

👉 Get instant access here

Built for action. Use responsibly. Good luck raising in 2026 🚀
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DePIN Fundraising Playbook 2026 is Live 🚀

Earlier we shared a ready-to-use list of 150+ verified DePIN investors. This article is the practical extension to that database. It explains how DePIN fundraising actually works in 2026 and why most founders waste months pitching the wrong investors.

Inside the playbook:
• What DePIN investors really care about today
• Why revenue beats node count and hype
• Which DePIN sub-sectors are getting funded right now
• Real valuation and traction benchmarks for seed and Series A
• How to turn an investor list into real conversations and term sheets

If the database answers who to contact, this guide shows how to convert.

Required reading for founders building GPU compute, wireless, sensors, energy, mapping, storage, or real-world infrastructure.

👉 Read the full article here

Built for serious DePIN founders. Good luck raising 💪
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“Not enough traction” = the #1 vague pass reason from VCs. Here’s what investors usually mean 👇

Let’s dive into deals in the #DePIN vertical. We analyzed early-stage rounds closed in 2025 (plus investor conversations + what they backed and why) to answer one practical question:

What revenue traction (or revenue-adjacent proof) typically becomes “good enough” to unlock a check at each stage?

Here’s a rough benchmark we keep seeing across DePIN deals - patterns from real fundraising outcomes:

Pre-Seed: LOIs or pilot revenue
Seed: $50K–$500K ARR or a clear enterprise pipeline
Series A: $500K–$2M ARR + growth trajectory
Series B: $5M+ ARR + path to profitability

Why this matters: once you’re past pre-seed, “nodes deployed” or “token narrative” rarely substitutes for demand-side proof (who pays, why they pay, and whether it’s repeatable).

We broke down all you need to know about fundraising for DePIN startups in the full playbook: lane-specific KPIs (compute vs wireless vs sensors/data vs energy vs storage), valuation logic, and how investors actually make decisions.

➡️ Read Full guide: https://blog.innmind.com/depin-fundraising-playbook-2026/

& let’s discuss: What stage are you fundraising at, & what traction question keeps coming up in your calls? Feel free to share your InnMind startup profile for visibility!
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What languages unicorn founders speak in 2025? 🦄

A Stanford GSB research team looked at 1k+ US unicorn founders’ LinkedIn profiles & mapped the languages they actually speak:

- English is #1 (sure).
- But the real signal is the founder diverse diaspora: Spanish, French, German, Chinese, Hebrew, Hindi, Russian…
- 95 languages in total!

Btw, did you find your mother tongue on the chart?😉

IMHO: while the world is polarizing, tech builders are still shipping together.
And in 2025 (immigration tightening + “new tech” regulations + innovation barriers 💩), the ecosystems that keep winning are the ones that keep attracting builders with startup friendly policies. Agree?

💬 Drop in comments: what’s your native language?


Happy Sunday / Feliz domingo / Bon dimanche / Schönen Sonntag / 周日快乐 ☀️
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New Perk for Web3 Founders 🚀 Token Utility That Actually Works

Meet FOLIO — a plug-and-play prediction games platform that helps Web3 projects turn community attention into real engagement and token utility.

Instead of quests and giveaways, you launch prediction campaigns around roadmap events, ecosystem milestones, or market outcomes. Users participate, compete on leaderboards, and come back again and again. Your token becomes an access key, not a passive asset.

No engineering. No complex setup. Launch in minutes and measure engagement that matters.

🎁 InnMind Perk
Selected startups from our community get access to a free trial of FOLIO’s token-gated prediction campaigns. Perfect for testing engagement loops before scaling.

👉 Activate the perk here
Build smarter engagement. Move fast. Test real token utility 💥
🔎 AI Visibility Is the New SEO for Web3 Founders

In the last weeks, we’ve seen strong interest from our community around one topic: project visibility. Not just ranking on Google, but being discoverable where decisions now actually happen. Inside AI tools used by users and investors.

Search has changed permanently. People no longer browse pages. They ask ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini and act on the answers they get. If your Web3 project is missing from those answers, it is effectively invisible.

⚡️ We’ve published an in-depth guide that breaks down this shift and explains why traditional SEO is no longer effective for crypto startups. The article demonstrates how AI agents read, rank, and recommend projects, and outlines what founders can do now to adapt in 2026 and beyond.

If visibility matters for your growth or fundraising, this is a must-read.

👉 Read the full article here

🎁 Bonus for InnMind founders

Inside our Perks Club, we also offer an exclusive deal to help projects act on this immediately:

▪️ Free LLM SEO audit
▪️ 25% off AI optimisation services
▪️ Focused on visibility inside ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and other AI agents

This is AI Agent Optimisation, not old-school SEO.

👉 Check the perk here

Clear signals beat hype. Make your project readable for machines and trustworthy for humans 🚀
Merry Christmas to the InnMind community 🎄

This year wasn’t loud — it was real.
Building through uncertainty. Learning through friction. Shipping when it wasn’t obvious.
That’s what progress actually looks like.

If you’re still here — refining your product, talking to users, thinking long-term — you’re already doing the hard part right.

Thank you to every founder, investor, advisor, and partner who made InnMind a place for substance over noise.
We’re proud to build alongside you.

Take a breath, recharge, and come back with clarity.
2026 has work worth doing. ❤️
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🎄 Founder edition:
If you’re building even these days - RESPECT!

May your burn be low and your DAU be high.

2025 was brutal. If you’re still shipping, you’re already ahead.

Keep going. We’ll help where we can.
- InnMind
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🔥 When DeFi Trading Starts Thinking for You

Fragmented liquidity, dozens of tabs, manual execution, missed entries. That’s the everyday reality of decentralized trading today.

This is exactly the problem Flipper AI is tackling.

Flipper is building an intelligent trading layer on top of DeFi. Not another exchange, but a system that aggregates liquidity, analyses market conditions, and helps traders execute smarter decisions across chains. Solana is just the starting point.

Under the hood, Flipper combines AI-driven routing, advanced spot logic, and automation tools that feel closer to professional trading infrastructure than a typical DEX.

Why this approach stands out

🧠 AI optimises execution based on liquidity, slippage, and real market conditions
⚡️ Advanced spot logic, including conditional and delayed orders
🤖 Trading bots built directly on top of the aggregation layer
📊 One unified dashboard for spot, analytics, and future derivatives
🌐 Modular architecture designed for fast multi-chain expansion

And onboarding doesn’t start with complexity.

Flipper is growing its ecosystem through a Telegram Mini App that teaches crypto and DeFi in a gamified format. Users learn, complete missions, earn points, and gradually step into real trading tools. Education, engagement, and product adoption are designed to work together.

The product is already live in early form, and this is the phase where real user feedback matters most.

If you’re curious how AI-powered aggregation feels in practice and what next-gen DeFi trading infrastructure might look like, it’s worth taking a closer look.

👉 Join the waitlist & connect your wallet: @fl_whtbot
👉 Access Flipper MVP: https://app.flpp.io/

Building quietly, shipping early, and focusing on fundamentals. Exactly the kind of experiments we like to see in the InnMind ecosystem.
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2025 was a brutal bastard:
- VCs said “let’s stay in touch” and ghosted forever,
- tokens lived below TGE longer than most relationships,
- AI hype screamed “just wait one more quarter” - and nothing,
- while outages, wars, politics & tariff shocks reminded us everything's fragile AF.

If you’re reading this, you’re already top 1% in founder survivorship.
Seriously.
Most gave up back in March (or October).
You didn’t.
Be proud, founder.

Happy fucking 2026, builders! 🥂❄️

May your uphill startup grind finally turn into snowball success: traction compounds, revenue shows up out of nowhere, real users arrive and actually stick around, investors stop ghosting and start committing, and momentum finally works FOR you, not against.

We at InnMind were right there with everyone who refused to quit - through the dips, the delays, and the chaos.

In 2026 we’re dropping a ton of new tools that actually speed up fundraising and growth + significantly expanding liquid, active investors network. Means better investor matchmaking, fresh deal-flow features, and more.

Don’t forget to update your startup profile

Let’s make 2026 the year the snowball finally rolls downhill.
You’ve earned it!
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Quick check-in after the holidays 👀

New year, fresh momentum — time to get back into builder mode. What’s your main focus right now?
Anonymous Poll
61%
Fundraising
32%
Partnerships / bizdev
16%
Product & traction
13%
Tokenomics / strategy