Arch Labs, a developer in the decentralized finance (DeFi) space, has successfully raised $13 million to invest in the creation of “ArchVM”, a system aimed at introducing smart contract capabilities to Bitcoin.

Key Highlights:

• The funding round attributed a valuation of $200 million to Arch Labs, led by Pantera Capital.
• Arch’s initiative is to facilitate decentralized applications and protocols directly on Bitcoin, eliminating the need for asset bridging to layer-2 networks, which introduce additional risks.
• ArchVM will manage off-chain computations, allowing the implementation of “Turing-complete smart contracts at the Bitcoin base layer” and enabling transaction speeds comparable to those on Solana.

The push to integrate smart contracts into Bitcoin gained momentum with the recent launch of the BitVM computing language in October. Many projects are now emerging that use BitVM to enable smart contracts on Bitcoin through layer-2 networks or bridges. Arch’s approach aims to mitigate the challenges of bridging assets, thereby enhancing security and efficiency.