aZen Raises $1.2M Seed Round for Decentralized AI Computing

Author - personCMO Intern

5/03/2025

May 2, 2025 – aZen, a decentralized AI-native computing infrastructure project for Web3, today announced it has raised $1.2 million in seed funding. The round was led by Waterdrip Capital, with participation from DWF Ventures, Rootz Labs, Mindfulness Capital, Attention Ventures, Quantum Leap Lab, DePIN-X, and ODIG. This funding will be used to scale aZen's decentralized computing infrastructure and empower the next generation of AI-driven applications. In addition to the seed round, aZen's holding company secured a $40 million equity investment from UAE-based Royal Front LLC, further bolstering its long-term growth and ecosystem development. aZen has also been awarded strategic Web3 grants from Peaq, Internet Computer (ICP), and Swarm, strengthening cross-chain collaboration and expanding the reach of its decentralized physical infrastructure network (DePIN).

aZen is building a universal DePIN layer that connects underutilized edge devices, cloud resources, and AI workloads. This innovative approach unlocks new economic value for businesses, developers, and users by enabling efficient resource sharing and incentivizing participation through a tokenized ecosystem. The platform has already achieved significant traction, boasting over 600,000 app downloads, 360,000 monthly active users, and 80,000 active nodes on its DePIN Lite testnet.

"This is a defining moment for aZen," said Felix Xia, CEO of aZen. "With the support of world-class investors, strategic grants, and ecosystem partners, we are scaling a truly decentralized computing infrastructure that empowers the next era of AI-driven applications. Our goal is to unlock the full potential of Ubiquitous AI – making intelligent services accessible, efficient, and decentralized."

Key Features and Innovations:

aZen Protocol: Transforms computing power, AI models, and applications into dynamic fractional NFTs (dfNFTs), enabling tokenization, leasing, and secure execution.

ZenHive: A commercial-grade edge device offering scalable AI, data analytics, and customer acquisition services for businesses. ZenHive integrates seamlessly with ICP, leveraging its on-chain computation and storage for enhanced performance and cost-efficiency.

SocialFI AI Agent: Curates and amplifies high-value user-generated content across Web3 social platforms.

DeFAI: Integrates AI into DeFi, optimizing staking, credit scoring, and liquidity management.

Intelligent Compute Resource Scheduling: Optimizes resource allocation for maximum efficiency.

Privacy-Preserving Data Processing: Ensures data security and user privacy for AI model training and inference.

Addressing the Challenges of Decentralized AI:

The increasing demand for scalable, distributed computing for decentralized AI has exposed limitations in existing infrastructures. aZen addresses these challenges by providing:

Interoperability: Connecting disparate edge devices and cloud resources.

Scalability: Enabling seamless scaling of AI workloads.

Economic Incentives: Rewarding participants for contributing resources to the network.

Strategic Partnerships:

aZen's strategic partnerships with Zenlayer, a Tier 1 Infrastructure-as-a-Service provider with over 300 data centers worldwide, and collaborations with ICP, Peaq, and Swarm, further enhance its ability to deliver cross-platform DePIN resource sharing and liquidity. These partnerships demonstrate aZen's commitment to building a robust and collaborative ecosystem for decentralized AI computing.

About aZen:

aZen is the decentralized computing protocol for Ubiquitous AI. By transforming computing, AI, and applications into tokenized, on-demand services, aZen delivers a scalable, interoperable foundation for decentralized AI agents, dApps, and enterprise use cases.

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