Crypto VC RockawayX raises $125 million for second fund to primarily invest in Solana projects

RockawayX, a crypto venture capital firm with over $2 billion in assets under management, has closed its second fund, raising $125 million.The new fund will back early-stage crypto startups, with a strong focus on the Solana ecosystem, the firm said Thursday. Other target areas include decentralized finance (DeFi), infrastructure protocols and decentralized networks.Solana stands out due to its technical edge over Ethereum in terms of speed, cost, ease of development and its product-driven approach, Samantha Bohbot, partner and chief growth officer at RockawayX, told The Block. "Where other projects may feel like research efforts, Solana operates as a company with a mission to develop the dominant blockchain solution and promote it to builders and institutions," she said.As a result, RockawayX expects to allocate between 50% to 75% of its second fund — roughly $62 million to $94 million — to Solana-based projects, Bohbot said.RockawayX's first fund, which raised $120 million, also heavily bet on Solana. It backed the Solana Labs funding round in 2019 and later invested in Kamino Finance, Squads, Switchboard and other Solana-based projects."We've been focused on the Solana ecosystem since meeting Anatoly and Raj (Solana co-founders) at the 500 Startups incubator in San Francisco in early 2018," said Viktor Fischer, founder and CEO of RockawayX, in a statement. "Rather than investing in more L1s, we focused on building applications on Solana and being the first user for our founders: from providing liquidity, to running solvers and operating hardware services."That hands-on strategy reflects the firm's broader approach. RockawayX describes itself as an engineering-first investor. It runs validators out of its own European data centers and builds protocol-ready hardware tools like optimized GPUs.Across its divisions, RockawayX manages about $2 billion in assets, Bohbot said. Besides venture investing, the firm also actively provides liquidity across DeFi protocols and develops infrastructure in-house through its RockawayX Infrastructure unit. Its Labs division incubates web3 projects and open-source tools.RockawayX also operates a credit fund with around $110 million in assets under management, Bohbot said, adding that the fund has been one of the largest on-chain liquidity providers for over three years and now focuses primarily on on-chain deployments. Additionally, its "solver" unit or on-chain market-making division supports trading apps such as Wormhole, 1inch, Mayan and DeBridge.RockawayX's second fundThe firm began raising money for the second fund in March 2024, with more than two-thirds of commitments secured during Q4 2024 and Q1 2025, Bohbot said. The fund officially closed in Q1 2025, exceeding its original $120 million target, she added.Roughly 20% of the second fund has already been deployed into investments, including DoubleZero, Exponent, Hyperlend, Silhouette, Fragmetric and OnRe, according to Bohbot.The fund's limited partners include Rockaway Capital, which was the largest investor in RockawayX's first fund, as well as a mix of family offices, private equity firms, high-net-worth individuals and crypto founders, including Solana Labs co-founders Anatoly Yakovenko and Raj Gokal, Bohbot said.RockawayX credited the successful raise of the second fund to the ability to return capital from its first fund. That fund delivered a 2.1x DPI (distributions to paid-in capital) and currently holds a 5.4x MOIC (multiple on invested capital), including wins like Solana, Wintermute and Morpho Labs, the firm said.RockawayX currently employs over 45 people, with a large portion working in its infrastructure division. Bohbot said the firm is hiring for roles including an infrastructure analyst, Solana researcher and a Solana product manager focused on the DoubleZero network.The Funding newsletter: Stay updated on the latest crypto funding news and trends with my free bimonthly newsletter, The Funding. Sign up here!Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet that delivers news, research, and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor of The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the crypto space. Crypto exchange Bitget is an anchor LP for Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to deliver objective, impactful, and timely information about the crypto industry. Here are our current financial disclosures.© 2025 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.