Author's Viewpoint: Tim Hafner, Founder and CEO of OpenServ
Launchpads were initially designed to connect Web3 projects with early investors. However, the way they currently operate often leads to fundraising rather than long-term success. This has resulted in a flood of unfinished products entering the market without providing real support for builders.
As of February 2025, Virtuals Protocol has facilitated the issuance of over 17,000 AI agent tokens, indicating that the token issuance infrastructure has not slowed down. However, questions remain about the long-term sustainability and accountability of launchpads.
Projects lacking substantial content are receiving funding, ultimately leading to failures, which reflects deep-seated issues within the industry. Launchpads have become hollow funnels that provide funding to projects without requiring a real product or technological foundation.
Launchpads were designed as a meeting point for builders and believers, helping new projects raise funds and increase brand awareness while allowing global investors to participate early in promising technologies. This approach fills an important gap by making it easier for teams to obtain funding and community support.
As the industry matures, this model has exposed its limitations. Many launchpads still focus on fundraising rather than achieving long-term success. In this sense, they remain stuck in the past, resembling a decentralized version of "Shark Tank" rather than an innovation engine. Launchpads have not led technological innovation; instead, they have completely eliminated this category.
Many launchpads pride themselves on being chain-agnostic, positioning themselves as neutral arenas for protocol fundraising. This neutrality has also resulted in a lack of focus and standards, turning them into chaotic battlegrounds that cannot help the best projects stand out and grow.
Some believe that innovation should not be regulated and that anyone should be able to raise funds. However, without a focus on real, complex technology or clear guardrails for token design, launchpads can become brutal arenas where no one wins. Investors are bombarded with half-baked pitches and shallow hype cycles, while builders struggle to raise capital without meaningful support.
This approach applies to early Web3 projects that prioritize token distribution over long-term growth. However, this model is no longer beneficial for the market. The era of quick wins and low-investment launches is over. With increased regulatory scrutiny, the next generation of launchpads must move beyond theory into action, only launching projects with real products.
Most builders need to use three to four unrelated tools simultaneously to deliver projects. Numerous factors must be considered, including building backends, maintenance costs, server hosting, and security systems. It is not surprising that promising projects stall before they truly begin.
Building a real product requires a significant amount of work. Traditional launchpads narrowly focus on helping projects raise capital. But capital cannot help solve operational bottlenecks. Builders, especially those without substantial funding or backgrounds, need end-to-end support from their launchpads to streamline the entire process.
The concept of launchpads needs to be: "providing builders with the tools they need to focus on the product," rather than having them piece together scaffolding as they move forward.
In addition to better tools, launchpads need to evolve to enable developers to build truly powerful applications that solve real user problems. Modern platforms must provide the infrastructure to create applications with real utility, user adoption, and revenue generation, not just deploy token contracts.
As 2025 becomes the year of AI agents, projects will profit by introducing powerful platforms to build applications and then constructing launchpads around these applications. This creates a cycle where successful applications drive platform adoption, attracting more developers and creating valuable applications, builders, and users that solve large-scale real problems through network effects.
If launchpads want to be part of the solution, they must break free from their constraints. They have a unique position in driving technological innovation, but without better tools, there will be no better projects.
The next generation of launchpads must move beyond token distribution and focus on helping builders create better products. This means providing end-to-end support through building and developing products, along with clear incentives and guardrails to ensure everyone's interests are aligned.
Author's Viewpoint: Tim Hafner, Founder and CEO of OpenServ.
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This article is for general informational purposes only and is not intended to be, nor should it be construed as, legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.
Original: “Viewpoint: Web3 Launchpads Funding Ideas, Not Products”
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