Walmart and Outlier Ventures’ Web3 Accelerator launches with five startups

Image credits: Nicholas Kam/AFP/Getty Images

Walmart’s incubation division Store Nº8 and Outlier Ventures have partnered to launch Store Nº8 Base Camp, a Web3 accelerator program. TechCrunch first investigated the group.

The 12-week virtual incubator program included a flagship group of five companies specializing in topics such as improving Web3 marketing, advertising, and payment technology, among others. These startups are based in the US, Italy, Poland, and the UK.

“At Walmart, we see the growth and expansion of increasingly immersive virtual worlds as an opportunity not only to develop new ways to meet and engage with customers, but also to experiment with new types of commerce. ” said Thomas Kang. Metaverse of Walmart and Store No8 He is Vice President and General Manager of Commerce.

Web3 allows customers to buy not only virtual goods but also real-world goods, providing an opportunity to connect physical and virtual lives, Kang said. “Over the next year, we will be testing different experiences in the virtual world that connect to in-store commerce and vice versa.”

The program focuses on “decentralized commerce,” which means improving the retailer and consumer experience through Web3 innovation.

Last month, Pudgy Penguins, best known for its 8,888-piece NFT collection, launched its toy line in more than 2,000 Walmart stores across the United States. It is a decentralized and adaptive protocol framework,” said Benjamin Meyer, his CPO at Outlier Ventures. “This transition is designed to improve efficiency, trust, fairness, and overall user experience for both retailers and consumers around the world.”

The program is protocol agnostic and the team works across different blockchains. Each project received a $200,000 grant from Synergis Capital and corporate advice from KPMG US. Startups will also receive access and support from Store Nº8’s network across e-commerce, retail, marketing, media, Web3, gaming and venture.

Despite the ongoing bear market in cryptocurrencies, incubation and other accelerator programs offer hope for the future. “These challenging times are also an opportunity for founders to hone their core value proposition, gain market traction and foster a culture of innovation and efficiency,” said Ruth Galvin, Program Manager at Outlier Ventures. I am.

More than 370 startups applied, and only these five teams made it to the finals.

Company Name: high lab

function: web3 advertising

Founders: Joe Kim, Edward Wen

stage: seed

pitch: At HypeLab, we want to make Web3 advertising simple. It aims to help businesses get their products in front of his Web3 users through design services such as a “self-service advertiser portal” that helps build campaign assets. The startup also offers on-chain and off-chain options that allow advertisers to choose where they want to advertise. The company says it offers users a software development kit that allows them to insert ads into decentralized applications “in less than 20 minutes.” It is backed by investors including Coinbase Ventures, Shima Capital, Dispersion Capital, and OP Crypto.

Company Name: expose

function: Programmable payment infrastructure

Founder: Adrian Stern

stage: seed

pitch: Reveel is an on-chain payments infrastructure and author tool that can help startups automate their accounting and payments infrastructure. According to the company’s website, its ecosystem consists of numerous applications, brands, and networks, including Ethereum, Polygon, Alchemy, and Zola. This platform helps startups manage all their revenue through his one dashboard and offers customizable payment flows. This infrastructure is multi-chain capable and can process any token on the platform. Developers can also implement Reveel’s revenue sharing protocol into their projects through the software development kit, allowing creators to share their revenue with other users. Backed by Binance Labs, Moment Ventures, Anamcara, and Pixelynx.

Company Name: tide protocol

function: Data-driven Web3 marketing

Founder: Silvio Busonero, Vincenzo Manzon

stage: seed

pitch: Tide Protocol is a marketing and analytics suite that helps Web3 startups create and customize marketing campaigns. Powered by Polygon Studios, it works on Ethereum-compatible blockchains without any coding experience. According to Crunchbase, it is backed by Outlier Ventures.

Company Name: token guard

function: Analytics platform for Web3 growth

Founder: Kamil Gorski, Jakub Rozek, Damien Rolek

stage: pre-seed

pitch: Tokenguard is an analytics platform focused on helping Web3 projects grow. We support blockchain and crypto projects such as Polkadot, Moonbean, Aleph Zero, Astar, and Kusama. The platform offers decentralized applications, as well as on-chain and off-chain analytics, ecosystem growth tracking, and cryptographic APIs. According to Crunchbase, it is backed by Outlier Ventures and NCBR Investment Fund ASI SA.

Company Name: unblock

function: cross-border payments

Founder: Viv Das, Remi Tuyaerts, Alastair Preacher, Didier Bachlin

stage: seed

pitch: Unblock’s portal helps you enable business payments on Web3 through our free API infrastructure. It also helps simplify the process of migrating to encryption. Its API-based solution eliminates complexities related to users’ KYC and assists with customer compliance, risk monitoring, and more. The platform is available to businesses, individuals, and applications through a white-label API and offers transfer speeds of less than 20 seconds and transaction fees starting from 0.5%. According to Crunchbase, the company is backed by Outlier Ventures, Celo Ecosystem, and others.