Why Hack VC Led SatLayer’s Seed Round
By Alex Botte, Partner at Hack VC
SatLayer is building the economic layer for Bitcoin. Just as Ethereum’s ecosystem was unlocked by the rise of restaking platforms like Eigenlayer, SatLayer brings that same programmability, flexibility, and composability to one of the world’s most pristine assets: BTC.
SatLayer enables BTC holders to restake their BTC and earn sustainable, protocol-native rewards from applications secured by BTC. It’s a vision that positions BTC not just as a store of value, but as the foundational asset powering the next wave of decentralized apps.
The Vision: Unlocking Bitcoin’s Economic Utility
Despite having the highest market cap, broadest brand awareness, and strongest settlement assurances in crypto, BTC has historically sat idle. Unlike ETH, which can be staked, restaked, and deployed across thousands of apps, BTC has lacked programmability. Its holders have had to choose between HODLing passively or sending their BTC to relatively risky bridges and centralized lenders.
SatLayer closes that gap.
Built atop Babylon (another Hack VC portfolio company - we led the Series A), SatLayer introduces Bitcoin Validated Services (BVSs). These are protocols and applications that can be secured by restaked BTC. SatLayer provides the slashing conditions, operator network, and coordination layer needed to enforce economic guarantees in a trust-minimized way. It brings real programmability and real yield to BTC without compromising on the core values of the asset or the chain.
In doing so, SatLayer unlocks a new economic model: one where BTC becomes the gold standard collateral layer for the decentralized economy.
SatLayer vaults already allow users to deposit BTC and liquid staked tokens (LSTs) on Babylon to begin earning rewards. And because SatLayer is the exclusive BTC restaking partner for Babylon (and the only BTC restaking partner of Sui and Berachain, both Hack VC portfolio companies), it’s positioned at the very center of Bitcoin’s emerging app layer.
Soon operators and protocols will be able to register their services to be secured by SatLayer, a shared security marketplace powered by BTC itself.
Why Hack VC Led the Seed Round
At Hack VC, we’ve long believed that the next generation of crypto infrastructure will be shaped by modularity and restaking. We’ve led investments in Eigenlayer (restaking for ETH), Babylon (restaking for BTC), and now SatLayer, the economic coordination layer that makes BTC programmable and composable.
In many ways, SatLayer is to Babylon & Bitcoin what Eigenlayer is to Ethereum: a restaking marketplace enabling developers to tap into BTC’s unmatched economic security. But where Eigenlayer is focused primarily on Ethereum-native assets, SatLayer focuses on BTC, Babylon, and beyond. It extends BTC’s capabilities not just to Babylon’s own chain, but to cross-chain oracles, bridges, DA layers, appchains, and more, making SatLayer a restaking superlayer purpose-built for the Bitcoin era.
We were also drawn to the caliber of the founding team:
- Luke Xie, former founder of Press Start Capital and core contributor to the MIT x Harvard Blockchain Accelerator.
- Arun Devabhaktuni, a world-class researcher and technical advisor who previously led research at Mirana and contributed to Babylon, Ante, and more.
- Spencer Yang, one of the most respected advisors in the Bitcoin ecosystem.
This is a team that has spent years operating in the trenches of Web3, AI hardware, and systems design. Their execution is fast, their architecture is thoughtful, and their ecosystem alignment with Babylon and a growing number of BVSs is already strong.
We also appreciated SatLayer’s focus on real, revenue-generating use cases, especially in DeFi, RWAs, and infrastructure. Its early BVS integrations reflect that focus, with flagship implementations emerging around BTC-backed insurance, prime brokerage, and liquidation protection. In these models, restaked BTC provides real economic value, earning premiums as programmable collateral and serving as instant settlement liquidity.
Notably, SatLayer is working with partners like Nexus Mutual, OnRe/Nayms, Native, Morpho, Avalon, RedStone, and others to co-develop BTC-backed BVS primitives that mirror traditional insurance, reinsurance, and prime brokerage models, all of which are powered by the underlying BTC vaults.
Early Traction and Near‑Term Catalysts
SatLayer is already live, with over $400M in total value locked and more than 3,000 BTC restaked. This speaks to the massive latent demand for safe, on-chain BTC yield.
More importantly, the ecosystem is already real. Nearly 30 BVS projects are already building with SatLayer, including several Hack VC portfolio companies like Berachain, Hyperlane, Spicenet, Gaib, and Sui. Other high-quality partners include LayerZero, Plume, Avail, Euler, Cap Labs, NAVI, and RedStone, with additional integrations to be announced soon.
Together, these unlock a flywheel:
It’s a compounding effect that rewards early adopters and aligns incentives across users, operators, and developers.
SatLayer LPs can even “stack yield” from multiple sources, earning rewards from SatLayer, Babylon, L1/L2 protocols, and BTC LSTs, all before even entering downstream DeFi.
The next major catalysts include:
- The onboarding of operators to validate BVSs and earn protocol fees
- The launch of new BVS integrations beyond Babylon, including oracle networks, DA layers, and appchains
- An expanding set of vault integrations for BTC and BTC LSTs, creating a liquid and composable restaking economy
Looking Ahead: A Bet on Bitcoin, Restaking, and Babylon
The opportunity for SatLayer is clear: Bitcoin represents over $2T in idle capital. Restaking is a proven model for unlocking latent yield, and Babylon provides the substrate for building a slashing- and reward-driven coordination layer. SatLayer brings these elements together with a clean, modular architecture and a developer-first ethos.
To be clear, this is a bet-on-a-bet: SatLayer’s success is highly correlated with Babylon’s execution. But as early lead investors in Babylon, we have strong conviction in that project and believe that SatLayer is the natural economic layer to emerge atop it.
SatLayer is live, growing, and already generating yield. In our opinion, it is the best current implementation of a Bitcoin-native restaking economy, and it’s powered by a team with both vision and technical depth.
At Hack VC, we’re proud to be early backers of SatLayer. If you're building a BVS or looking to earn BTC yield in a trust-minimized way, check out satlayer.io.
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