Singapore’s Startale Secures $2 B Series A Funding from Sony Innovation Fund

Singapore – February 2, 2026 — Singapore-based blockchain and consulting firm Startale Group has successfully raised approximately ¥2 billion (about $2 billion) in the first close of its Series A funding round. The capital comes from the Sony Innovation Fund, deepening the strategic partnership between the two companies and marking a major milestone for Startale’s growth plans.

The investment reflects Sony’s strong confidence in Startale’s vision to expand the next generation of on-chain infrastructure — especially solutions that bring together entertainment, intellectual property (IP) services and artificial intelligence (AI) on blockchain platforms.

Startale’s Strategic Role in Blockchain Innovation

Startale Group has become a key contributor to Soneium, an Ethereum Layer 2 blockchain co-developed with Sony Block Solutions Labs — a joint venture set up by Sony and Startale to build infrastructure for global Web3 use cases.

Since the Soneium mainnet launch in January 2025, the network has seen robust growth:

• Over 500 million transactions processed
• More than 5.4 million active wallets
• Support for 250+ live decentralized applications (dApps)
  These achievements mark Soneium as one of the most active Layer 2 ecosystems in the blockchain world.

Alongside this, Startale has developed key products in the Soneium ecosystem, including:

• Startale App – a gateway application combining wallet features, asset management and access to decentralized services
• Startale USD (USDSC) – a stablecoin designed to support payments and settlement across the network

Partnership With Sony Innovation Fund

The Sony Innovation Fund specializes in backing early and growth-stage technology companies that show promise in disruptive innovation. This latest investment builds on a multi-stage cooperation that began in 2023, when Sony first supported Startale in seed funding and jointly launched Sony Block Solutions Labs.

Startale’s CEO, Sota Watanabe, said the company shares a bold goal with Sony: to bring global users and creators fully on-chain. He added that Sony’s continued backing strengthens Startale’s ability to deliver large-scale blockchain infrastructure for real world users.

In a statement, Kazuhito Hadano, CEO of Sony Ventures Corporation — which manages the Sony Innovation Fund — noted that Startale is building “new value flows” using on-chain technology. He expressed confidence that the partnership would support future entertainment and technology innovations.

What This Means for the Blockchain Sector

The funding marks a rare and substantial commitment in the Web3 space, especially for infrastructure that supports entertainment, digital identity, AI-enabled services and community-driven digital assets. Analysts say such investments point to growing interest in blockchain platforms that can handle major enterprise-level operations.

For Startale, the new capital will go toward expanding its technology offerings, onboarding more developers to the Soneium ecosystem, and exploring new uses of on-chain solutions in gaming, content distribution, and AI-enhanced applications.

As blockchain technology continues to evolve, this funding signals the growing appeal of enterprise-grade decentralized infrastructure and its potential to reshape digital content, financial systems and user engagement models worldwide.