Bitlayer Labs, a Bitcoin layer-2 network, has raised USD 11 million in a Series A funding round led by Franklin Templeton and ABCDE. Participating companies include Stake Capital Group, WAGMI Ventures, Skyland Ventures, Flow Traders, Metalpha, 280 Capital, and Caladan.

The company plans to use the funding to expand its ecosystem by supporting the development of native protocols on its network. Moreover, the protocol also announced the development of “Mainnet-V2," a Bitcoin-native rollup that combines zero-knowledge and fraud-proof technology.

Analyst QuickTake: The Bitcoin layer-2 space has seen a large influx in investor interest, with companies such as Arch Labs , ZKM , and Botanix Labs raising USD 7 million , USD 5 million , and USD 8.5 million , respectively, in the last 3 months. Notably, Bitlayer has raised back-to-back funding over the last three months, securing an undisclosed investment from OKX in May and raising USD 5 million in late March. Besides funding, the company has also been active in the space via partnerships; for instance, its recent partnership with Velar , a decentralized exchange, aimed to support the launch of its “Artha” perpetual decentralized exchange (Perp DEX) on the Bitcoin blockchain.