Crunch Lab, the main contributor behind CrunchDAO, secured $5 million in a strategic funding round to enhance its decentralized artificial intelligence predictions network, a system noted for contributing to cancer research advancements at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
This new funding round raises the protocol’s total financial backing to $10 million, which will be utilized to develop an institutional “intelligence layer” for decentralized AI, as stated in a Tuesday announcement shared with Cointelegraph.
The round was co-led by Galaxy Ventures and Road Capital, with involvement from VanEck and Multicoin, taking place in June.
Crunch Lab aspires to transform enterprise forecasting challenges into “encrypted modeling competitions,”rewarding participants who develop the most precise predictive models.
“When thousands of practitioners compete, you uncover solutions even the best internal teams miss,” remarked Jean Herelle, co-founder and CEO of Crunch Lab, in a conversation with Cointelegraph. “Instead of vying for scarce talent, we provide enterprises secure access to it all through a decentralized network.”
Funding to drive decentralized AI innovation
Crunch Lab’s methodology employs blockchain-based incentives to “decentralize” the process of developing AI intelligence by enabling data scientists to compete anonymously while safeguarding data privacy.
The newly formed decentralized AI network may act as an “intelligence layer for global enterprises,” according to Will Nuelle, general partner at Galaxy.
“Whether predicting asset prices, optimizing energy demand, or enhancing healthcare diagnostics, CrunchDAO’s crowdsourced models facilitate smarter, faster decision-making,” he emphasized.
The funding is intended to expand the network into real-world industries beyond finance and biomedical research.
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Crunch Lab’s AI drives real-world breakthroughs
Crunch Lab’s crowdsourced AI solution is already yielding notable results for premier global institutions, including the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, which made significant strides in cancer gene research therapy through its computer vision technology.
“Crunch’s network is already being utilized in genuine research,” stated Herelle. “The Eric and Wendy Schmidt Center employed it to develop superior computer vision models for cancer detection from cell images.”
Herelle further mentioned that Nobel Prize-winning economist Guido Imbens utilized Crunch Lab’s platform to create one of the first algorithms adept at revealing causal relationships among economic variables.
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It also achieved “double-digit accuracy improvements” for the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) Research Lab, which is the research division of one of the globe’s largest sovereign wealth funds, stewarding over $1 trillion.
CrunchDAO was also chosen for the Solana Incubator’s second cohort in early 2025, aimed at promoting projects that foster the mainstream adoption of the Solana network.
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