Social Token Site Roll Gets Boost With $10M Series A Led by IOSG Ventures

The aim is to become the “Stripe for social tokens,” said CEO Bradley Miles.

AccessTimeIconSep 28, 2021 at 1:01 p.m. UTC
Updated May 11, 2023 at 5:48 p.m. UTC
10 Years of Decentralizing the Future
May 29-31, 2024 - Austin, TexasThe biggest and most established global hub for everything crypto, blockchain and Web3.Register Now

Social token builder Roll has raised $10 million in Series A funding led by IOSG Ventures with participation from Animoca Brands, Alchemy, Huobi Ventures, Weekend Fund, Mischief Fund and Audacity.

The new financing brings Roll’s total funding to $12.7 million since it launched in 2019; existing backers include Galaxy Interactive, Hustle Fund, entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk, Brud founder Trevor McFederies, Messari founder and CEO Ryan Selkis and Balaji Srinivasan, entrepreneur and former CTO of Coinbase.

  • How NEAR Enables Multichain Access From One Account
    00:56
    How NEAR Enables Multichain Access From One Account
  • Why the NEAR foundation Chose Eigenlayer as a Security Partner
    00:54
    Why the NEAR foundation Chose Eigenlayer as a Security Partner
  • Judge Kaplan Had 'No Love' for Sam Bankman-Fried, Legal Expert Says
    07:08
    Judge Kaplan Had 'No Love' for Sam Bankman-Fried, Legal Expert Says
  • How Bitcoin and Ether's Options Contracts Combined Expiry Could Spike Volatility
    01:11
    How Bitcoin and Ether's Options Contracts Combined Expiry Could Spike Volatility
  • Internet creators and communities find themselves in a digital renaissance powered by the growing popularity of blockchain technologies like non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and decentralized finance (DeFi). Roll provides developers of games, marketplaces and others with the infrastructure and application programming interfaces (APIs) to seamlessly create and integrate social tokens into new or existing web applications.

    Roll, which saw some of its social tokens hacked back in March of this year, competes head on with other well-known social token startups such as Rally.

    The aim now is to become the “Stripe for social tokens,” said Bradley Miles, co-founder and CEO of Roll (also an early researcher and contributor to the CoinDesk “State of Blockchain” report back in 2015).

    “We started with this idea that digital communities will inevitably have their own monetary systems that will exist completely independent of platforms,” Miles said in an interview.

    A fascinating development, said Miles, is watching the social tokens developed using Roll, such as the branded currency attached to digital creator and NFT collector WhaleShark, for instance, being listed on exchanges and beginning to explore the world of DeFi.

    “Thanks to DeFi, we are literally able to start to make markets for some of these communities as well,” said Miles, adding:

    “Instead of just getting a million subscribers, it could be more interesting to create a market thinking about your community as a digital asset and seeing what ownership is like for that community instead of subscribing or donating.”

    Jocy Lin, founding partner of IOSG Ventures, sees social tokens overlapping with the concept of decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs), a blockchain-based governance structure enjoying a resurgence at the moment.

    “Through Roll, DAOs and communities can tokenize, trade and gate-keep content for those that are part of the community,” Lin said in a statement. “Anyone holding a community’s social token is welcome to join and contribute.”

    Disclosure

    Please note that our privacy policy, terms of use, cookies, and do not sell my personal information has been updated.

    CoinDesk is an award-winning media outlet that covers the cryptocurrency industry. Its journalists abide by a strict set of editorial policies. In November 2023, CoinDesk was acquired by the Bullish group, owner of Bullish, a regulated, digital assets exchange. The Bullish group is majority-owned by Block.one; both companies have interests in a variety of blockchain and digital asset businesses and significant holdings of digital assets, including bitcoin. CoinDesk operates as an independent subsidiary with an editorial committee to protect journalistic independence. CoinDesk employees, including journalists, may receive options in the Bullish group as part of their compensation.

    Ian Allison

    Ian Allison is an award-winning senior reporter at CoinDesk. He holds ETH.


    Learn more about Consensus 2024, CoinDesk's longest-running and most influential event that brings together all sides of crypto, blockchain and Web3. Head to consensus.coindesk.com to register and buy your pass now.


    Read more about