Author: Nicky, Foresight News

With the recent price surge of privacy coins like ZEC, the privacy sector has once again become the focus of market attention. a16z crypto recently emphasized on social media, "As cryptocurrencies reach more mainstream users, the demand for privacy is more urgent than ever."

Against this backdrop, the privacy blockchain project Seismic announced the completion of a new round of financing amounting to $10 million, marking the second time a16z crypto has led investment in this project this year. The project has completed two rounds of financing, totaling $17 million. In March 2025, it announced a $7 million seed round financing led by a16z crypto, with participation from Polychain, 1kx, and others; on November 12, it completed another $10 million financing, with a16z crypto continuing to lead and new investors including Amber Group, with funds primarily allocated for technology development and ecosystem expansion.

Project Positioning and Technical Features

Seismic is a privacy-protecting blockchain specifically designed for fintech scenarios. The project is built on EVM, allowing developers to use the familiar Solidity language for development, with additional syntax to control privacy settings. This design reduces the learning curve for developers while providing necessary privacy protection capabilities.

The core technical features of the project are reflected in three aspects. Through protocol layer encryption and secure hardware support, Seismic achieves default privacy protection settings. The project employs Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) technology instead of zero-knowledge proof schemes, requiring all nodes to operate within TEE to ensure data security. The system introduces new data types for masking, including masked integers, booleans, and addresses, enabling developers to handle private data conveniently.

Additionally, Seismic Reth, as its native execution client, further enhances privacy capabilities: it supports private storage, encrypted transactions, and integrates six new precompiled contracts (such as AES-GCM encryption, ECDH key exchange), facilitating quick access to privacy features for developers. This client was open-sourced in October 2024 to lower the entry barrier for developers.

Seismic was founded by Lyron Co Ting Keh, who holds a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science and Mathematics from Stanford University. He previously founded an edtech company, developed a Ruby on Rails training platform, and participated in tool development for privacy projects like Zcash and Aztec.

Core engineer Peter He previously led the development of Ethereum application-specific blockchain frameworks, specializing in distributed systems and privacy technology, and is currently responsible for the technical implementation of Seismic. Business development head Terence focuses on promoting fintech collaborations, aiming to extend Seismic's privacy capabilities to more financial scenarios. Although the team has not been fully disclosed, many members come from institutions such as Wintermute, Google X, and Apple R&D, based on publicly available resumes.

In September of this year, the first application built on Seismic, Brookwell, was officially launched. This fintech product, developed by entrepreneurs Ravi and Rohan, aims to allow users to earn DeFi yields while using traditional payment channels.

Brookwell chose to build on Seismic primarily due to its privacy protection capabilities. The application handles deeply personal financial transactions, including rent payments and salary disbursements, which are sensitive data not suitable for public visibility on a public chain. Through Seismic's privacy protection technology, Brookwell can connect cryptocurrencies with traditional financial systems while protecting user privacy. The project's official website has opened a Waitlist application.

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