Coinbase and others back former US presidents of FTX, the startup architect of crypto trading infrastructure • TechCrunch

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It’s been nearly four months since Brett Harrison stepped down as chairman of FTX US, the now-bankrupt U.S. division of the crypto exchange. Now, he’s raised $5 million for his own startup, Architect, which aims to build trading infrastructure for big-name crypto investors.

It’s a software company aiming to build institutional-grade infrastructure to connect various crypto sites across decentralized and centralized exchanges, Harrison told TechCrunch. Let’s try to facilitate the interface with qualified guards or self-guard. We are building this unique interoperability platform between crypto services with a focus on trading.

The startup raised capital in a pre-product funding round from Coinbase Ventures, Circle Ventures, SV Angel, SALT Fund, P2P, Third King Venture Capital, and Motivate Venture Capital. Angel investors Shari Glazer, CEO of Kalos Labs, and Anthony Scaramucci, former White House communications director and founder of Skybridge, are also among its investors.

Prior to FTX, Harrison worked at traditional financial institutions such as Citadel Securities and Jane Street. He also spent around 11 years developing algorithmic trading software for the global equity and derivatives markets.

Speaking with many former FTX clients and thinking about my own background, one of the biggest barriers to people entering trading is building the infrastructure to access all these different venues, said Harrison. There is a huge technological learning curve to do this.

Architect aims to appeal to everyone from large traders and hedge funds to trading firms, asset managers, VCs or anyone who needs to build infrastructure for crypto on more than one exchange, Harrison said.

A startup like this could meet the current market demand from big players for more unified and accessible platforms to connect their crypto services, instead of having a handful of open tabs and servers. The startup is launching a pre-product, so its flagship service will need to be transparent and offer a simpler user experience to win over other crypto services.

The capital will be used for hiring and product development. Architect will first develop adaptable infrastructure products so that institutions can trade in both centralized and decentralized crypto markets. The company plans to launch its service in the second quarter of this year.

I thought we could make a difference in increasing the security and maturity of the space by helping traders adapt to the changing structure of the crypto market without having to build this software themselves, said Harrison said. So traders and trading companies can focus on monetization, alpha, and building building blocks.

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