Irys lands $10M to launch the world’s first programmable datachain

UK-based blockchain startup Irys has raised a $10 million Series A led by CoinFund, with backing from Hypersphere, Tykhe, Varrock, Breed VC, Echo Group, Amber Group, and WAGMI. The round brings Irys’s total funding to $20 million since 2024.

Founded by Josh Benaron, Irys calls itself the first programmable datachain - a blockchain that doesn’t just store data, but lets it act. Developers can embed logic directly into data, enabling automated licensing, AI workflows, and on-chain royalty enforcement without third-party layers.

Think of it as the AWS moment for on-chain data: a unified stack where storage and execution live together. Irys is EVM-compatible, infinitely scalable, and offers predictable costs pegged to physical storage instead of volatile tokens.

Traction is already visible. Irys’s testnet has attracted 80+ partners, processed more than 600 million transactions, and hit 4 million daily active wallets. The team says mainnet launch is near.

CoinFund partner Seth Ginns called Irys the “infrastructure layer for the AI economy," positioning it as core infrastructure for the next wave of AI-driven applications.

The pitch is simple: in a world where data powers AI, finance, and creative industries, static storage isn’t enough. Data has to enforce rules, interact with code, and transact value natively. Irys wants to be the chain where that happens.

Irys is betting the future of crypto isn’t just coins or contracts - it’s programmable data as the substrate for the AI economy.