Cryptocurrency exchange platform Binance has invested in a first round for Oasis Labs, based on research by Dawn Song at UC Berkeley.

Oasis Labs, a US-based blockchain-based cloud computing platform based on research at University of California (UC) Berkeley, has received $45m in funding from investors including cryptocurrency exchange platform Binance.

The round also featured crypto asset management firms Electric Capital and Polychain, crypto asset hedge funds Metastable and Pantera, and venture capital firms Accel, Data Collective, Foundation Capital and Andreessen Horowitz, the latter through its a16zcrypto vehicle.

Oasis Labs is developing a high-performance cloud computing platform on the blockchain that is intended to bring the heightened security, privacy and higher processing capabilities generally regarded as necessary if blockchain is to be widely adopted.

The product is set to include decentralised privacy-preserving smart contracts and the ability to scale in order to accommodate complex application workloads for functions such as machine learning.

Oasis is building on research led by chief executive Dawn Song, professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at UC Berkeley.

Song co-founded Oasis with her postdoctoral associate, Raymond Cheng, PhD candidate Noah Johnson and Bobby Jaros, who previously founded deep learning company Lookflow out of his PhD research at Stanford University.

The team collaborated with Srini Devadas and Ilia Lebedev, researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to further develop the technology, according to TechCrunch, though neither of them is listed as a co-founder on Oasis’ website.

Song said: “Blockchains are poised to revolutionise much of the way we live, but many developers and organisations have understandable concerns about performance and privacy limitations that are currently hindering their ability to embrace the technology.

“The Oasis platform aims to help users leverage and reclaim control over their data, and at the same time deliver superior performance and privacy capabilities. Our goal is to build the scalable and secure decentralised internet that puts users first.”

– A version of this article first appeared on our sister site, Global Corporate Venturing.