Membrane Labs Secures Second Patent for Digital Asset Settlement
Fintech firm Membrane Labs announced it has been issued a second U.S. patent for its non-custodial, credit-based digital asset settlement technology. The new patent extends protection for its coordinated, multi-chain settlement architecture, which is designed for institutional trading counterparties. The system allows for secure settlement without requiring firms to pre-fund wallets.
- The company, led by CEO Carson Cook, is staffed by veterans from major financial institutions including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, and Northern Trust. Other key leaders include Craig Birchall, Head of Lending and Settlements, formerly of Galaxy Digital and JPMorgan, and James Roth, Head of Partnerships, who spent over a decade at Goldman Sachs. - This new patent (U.S. Patent No. 12,555,099 B1) builds upon a previous one from 2023 (U.S. Patent No. 11,651,353 B1). Together, they create a protected framework for managing counterparty risk, netting obligations off-chain, and orchestrating settlement across multiple blockchains without a central custodian. - In October 2023, Membrane Labs raised $20 million in a Series A funding round. The investment was led by prominent firms such as Brevan Howard Digital and Point72 Ventures, with participation from Jane Street, Flow Traders, and Two Sigma Ventures. - Membrane Labs' technology is designed to enhance market liquidity and capital efficiency for institutional over-the-counter (OTC) trading. It allows for features like margin trading by cross-collateralizing fiat and crypto holdings. - The firm's platform serves as a "glue" for the digital asset ecosystem, providing a custody-agnostic settlement network that connects diverse custodial and wallet solutions for both crypto and fiat transfers. - Founder Carson Cook also created the Ethereum-based DeFi protocol Tokemak. His earlier experience with a market-making entity, Fractal Labs, revealed the crypto infrastructure challenges that Membrane Labs was established to solve. - The growth in institutional digital asset adoption is a key market trend supporting Membrane's business. In late 2024, one trading technology firm, Talos, saw a twofold increase in average institutional trading activity, with peaks reaching up to seven times the normal volume. - Non-custodial systems, where users retain full control of their private keys, are a core principle of decentralized finance. They reduce counterparty risk by eliminating reliance on a third party to hold assets, a crucial feature for secure institutional trading.
