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September 5, 2025 – Wildcat Labs, the pioneering developer behind the Wildcat lending protocol, today announced it has successfully closed a $3.5 million seed extension funding round. The round was led by Robot Ventures, with significant participation from Triton Capital, Polygon Ventures, Safe Foundation, Hyperithm, Hermeneutic Investments, and Kronos Research. Esteemed angel investors including Fei protocol founder Joey Santoro, Vyper core contributor Charles Cooper, and Ink founder Andrew Koller also joined the round.
This latest funding, structured as a Simple Agreement for Future Equity (SAFE) and valuing Wildcat Labs at $35 million post-money, brings the company’s total fundraising to $5.3 million. It follows a $750,000 pre-seed round from Wintermute Ventures in May 2023 and a $1.1 million seed round via Cobie's angel investor platform Echo between July and August 2024. The new capital will be instrumental in accelerating the adoption of on-chain undercollateralized credit and further integrating the Wildcat protocol into the broader Ethereum DeFi ecosystem.
Wildcat is revolutionizing private credit by bringing it on-chain, offering a unique solution to the long-standing challenge of undercollateralized lending in decentralized finance. Unlike traditional platforms, Wildcat does not underwrite loans itself. Instead, it empowers borrowers—primarily institutional players such as funds, market makers, and DAOs—to define and parameterize nearly every aspect of their credit markets, including interest rates, lockup periods, withdrawal cycles, reserve ratios, and custom lender access lists. This highly configurable approach ensures segregated markets and fixed interest rates, providing unparalleled flexibility and control.
"We are thrilled to invest in Wildcat as they tackle one of the biggest problems in DeFi — undercollateralized lending," said Anirudh Pai, Partner at Robot Ventures. "Its growth is testament to how much demand there is for cheap and safe private credit."
Wildcat’s innovative design allows for undercollateralized credit lines, moving beyond the rigid limitations of overcollateralization prevalent in most existing DeFi credit protocols like Aave, Euler, and Compound. The protocol generates revenue through a transparent fee structure, charging borrowers a small percentage (currently 5%) on top of the interest rate paid to lenders, which accrues to the protocol as reserves.
"Undercollateralized lending has long been a perennial challenge for DeFi. By allowing trusted borrowers to create their own bespoke markets, Wildcat moves beyond the rigid limitations of overcollateralization and creates a foundational layer for truly scalable and capital-efficient credit within DeFi," added Jason Brannigan, General Partner at Kronos Ventures.
The fresh capital will be primarily used to expand Wildcat Labs' current team, particularly on the engineering and business development fronts. This expansion will facilitate the creation of new types of markets and mechanisms, unlocking high-quality yield opportunities for lenders and providing critical liquidity for borrowers. With this raise, Wildcat Labs secures approximately two years of runway, even as the company is already profitable.
"Wildcat was created in order to allow the world the opportunity to participate in private credit markets typically restricted to inner circles, on terms visible to all," stated Laurence Day, Co-founder and CEO of Wildcat Labs. "Capital leverage is the heart of the modern world, and credit expansion — which increases liquidity available to be utilised in markets both onchain and offchain — fuels the growth of the overall industry. Wildcat is one of the final pieces that allows DeFi to truly claim that it has formed a parallel financial system."
Co-founded by crypto industry veterans Laurence Day and Dillon Kellar, with Wintermute's Evgeny Gaevoy as a "silent" partner, Wildcat was conceived to address the credit opacity that contributed to major collapses in the crypto space. By bringing private credit activity on-chain, Wildcat enhances risk visibility and aims to establish a robust framework for on-chain credit scores for institutional entities.
Since its launch, Wildcat has facilitated customizable undercollateralized credit lines for prominent entities such as Wintermute, Hyperithm, Selini Capital, Amber Group, and Keyrock. It has also supported emergency bridge financing following crypto protocol hacks and enabled pre-market token price speculation. The protocol currently handles $150 million in outstanding credit, with over $368 million originated since launch, experiencing a significant uptick after its generalized V2 release on the Ethereum mainnet in February.
Wildcat's commitment to security is paramount, with smart contracts publicly audited by industry-leading security organizations, actively shielded by advanced on-chain monitoring systems, and supported by a continuous bug bounty program.
About Wildcat Labs:
Wildcat Labs is the developer of the Wildcat protocol, a leading on-chain private credit platform enabling undercollateralized lending for institutional borrowers in the decentralized finance ecosystem. By empowering borrowers to define their own market parameters and connecting them with lenders, Wildcat is building the foundational layers for scalable and capital-efficient credit, fostering a more transparent and robust financial system on the blockchain.
Compiled by CMO Intern team
