RockawayX Closes $125M Fund, 50% to 75% for Solana Projects

RockawayX, a prominent crypto venture capital firm, has successfully closed its second fund, securing $125 million in capital. This fund is primarily earmarked for early-stage crypto startups, with a significant focus on projects within the Solana ecosystem. The firm's investment strategy also includes decentralized finance (DeFi), infrastructure protocols, and decentralized networks.

Solana's appeal lies in its technical advantages over Ethereum, particularly in terms of speed, cost, ease of development, and its product-driven approach. Samantha Bohbot, partner and chief growth officer at RockawayX, highlighted that Solana operates more like a company with a clear mission to develop a dominant blockchain solution, unlike other projects that may seem more like research efforts.

As a result, RockawayX anticipates allocating between 50% to 75% of its second fund, approximately $62 million to $94 million, to Solana-based projects. This focus on Solana is consistent with the firm's first fund, which also heavily invested in the Solana ecosystem. Notable investments from the first fund include Solana Labs, Kamino Finance, Squads, and Switchboard.

RockawayX's involvement with Solana dates back to early 2018 when the firm's founder and CEO, Viktor Fischer, met with Solana co-founders Anatoly Yakovenko and Raj Gokal at the 500 Startups incubator in San Francisco. This early engagement has shaped RockawayX's strategy of focusing on building applications on Solana rather than investing in additional Layer 1 (L1) blockchains.

The firm's hands-on approach is evident in its engineering-first investment strategy. RockawayX runs validators from its own European data centers and develops protocol-ready hardware tools, such as optimized GPUs. This strategy is part of the firm's broader approach to managing about $2 billion in assets across various divisions, including venture investing, liquidity provision across DeFi protocols, and infrastructure development through its RockawayX Infrastructure unit.

RockawayX's second fund began raising capital in March 2024, with more than two-thirds of commitments secured during the fourth quarter of 2024 and the first quarter of 2025. The fund officially closed in the first quarter of 2025, surpassing its original $120 million target. Approximately 30% of the second fund has already been deployed into investments, including DoubleZero, Exponent, Hyperlend, Silhouette, Fragmetric, and OnRe.

The fund's limited partners include Rockaway Capital, 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. The successful raise of the second fund is attributed to the firm's ability to return capital from its first fund, which delivered a 2.1x DPI (distributions to paid-in capital) and currently holds a 5.2x MOIC (multiple on invested capital), including notable wins like Solana, Wintermute, and Morpho Labs.

RockawayX currently employs over 45 people, with a significant portion working in its infrastructure division. The firm is actively hiring for roles including an infrastructure analyst, Solana researcher, and a Solana product manager focused on the DoubleZero network. This expansion reflects RockawayX's commitment to supporting the growth and development of the Solana ecosystem and the broader crypto industry.