Introducing the Octane Fund Winter 2022 Cohort • DeSo (Decentralized Social) Blockchain

▤ Summary

Today we are excited to announce our first group of venture-backed teams in the inaugural cohort of the Octane Fund for Winter 2022!Collectively, the DeSo Foundation has deployed $10 million to this first cohort of 16 teams, plus an additional $1M in equity-free development grants to ~23 other projects/developers that are in the earlier stages of the product life cycle.Before we take a deeper look at each of the companies that received funding in this cohort, its important to take a minute to understand why this is such a monumental day for the future of DeSo.Unlike the existing social media giants of today, the DeSo Foundation does not own the applications or content built on top of the DeSo blockchain.It is our belief that the best way to create the social media landscape of the future is by having content + assets stored on-chain, and then enabling any team, anywhere in the world, to build on top of this open database.With this model, social content is composable across apps for the first time. Powered by the DeSo blockchain, Diamond allows users to purchase a stake in their favorite profiles through Creator Coins, mint social NFTs in as little as 3 clicks, and give tips for posts they enjoy. With highly customizable no-code creator options, integration with real-time insights, and a mechanism for enabling social interactions within the NFT space, NFTz is a platform built for the future. Our ultimate vision is to become the go-to decentralized marketplace for all apps built on DeSo.We will continue accepting Octane grant and venture applications on a rolling basis, and will announce the dates for our second cohort later this year. To apply, please submit your application here.In addition to the 16 venture-backed teams, wed also like to take the time to highlight our 23 different teams/developers who received equity-free development grants this round:Its been an open secret that DAO functionality will be hitting the DeSo blockchain this month.

▦ Linked Companies

GitHub, Inc.

$1M to $5M