Mad News: August 2025 [hors-série]

Meet top founders and Solana legends who proudly rock a Mad Lad

Aug 31, 2025

This August edition is a special one, an hors-série if you will. Since I’m currently touching grass in Greece for my holidays, I didn’t have time to put together a classic newsletter… but instead, we’re doing something better: we’re diving into the stories of founders in the space who are proud Mad Lads holders

You’ll learn more about their projects, what being a Lad means to them, and how it’s helped them on their path to success

Once again, huge shoutout to everyone who took the time to answer these questions and MAD respect to every founder and team member out there proudly rocking a Mad Lad

Matty.SOL - WIDITDOTFUN

Matty.SOL has been part of the Solana ecosystem for over 5 years, starting out as a marketing manager before becoming a founder. For the past 2 years, he’s been building WIDITDOTFUN and now the project is finally ready to launch in September

WIDI dApp is the first mobile-native, AI-powered copy trading app on Solana. It’s set to go live in early September on the dApp Store, App Store, and Google Play. Their next big milestone? Onboarding top traders and trenchers to the platform and reaching their first major wave of adoption this September

In case you missed it, Matty won the auction on time.fun, which gave him the chance to pitch WIDITDOTFUN live to Toly and get direct feedback. A huge moment for him and for the project

For the Mad Lads community, it’s also a strong signal: build your dreams, believe in what you’re doing, and never give up

https://x.com/aeyakovenko/status/1919757070913474643

How did Matty got into Mad Lads?

For him, the answer is simple: “Mad Lads is a culture. If you’re on Solana, you don’t need a reason to hold one.” Not only is Matty a true Mad Lads, but he also loves being part of the community and deeply appreciates how the Lads show up to support builders from their own community

We’ll close with a quote directly from Matty :

Whatever you do, do it on Solana. Be a part of the future of finance.

Want to learn more about their project? https://x.com/WIDITDOTFUN

mattytay - Colosseum

Matty is the co-founder of Colosseum and if that’s not impressive enough, he also spent 4 years as Head of Growth at the Solana Foundation. To make it even better, he’s a proud Mad Lads enjoyoooorrr as he described himself

Colosseum is an organization built on three core pillars:

Solana’s official hackathons
A leading accelerator program
A dedicated venture fund

Colosseum has raised $60M and backed over 30 teams since 2024 in the Solana ecosystem. As you can guess, they’re not here to sit on their hands

After noticing that many top hackathon teams were using the Colosseum platform to find teammates, they started building a new Cofounder Matching Portal which is a tool where anyone can answer an in-depth set of questions and get paired with potential co-founders (chat, is this Tinder for builders?)

And that’s not all, they’re also launching a new initiative called Eternal: a perpetual hackathon that stays open year-round when global hackathons aren’t running. Since the beginning of the year, they’ve already invested in two projects that came through Eternal’s pipeline

How did Matty got into Mad Lads?

When Mad Lads launched, Matty swept several Lads to show support for Armani, Tristan and the Backpack team. He instantly resonated with the artwork and has been proudly rocking his Skulls PFP ever since and he’s not planning on changing it anytime soon

Being part of the Mad Lads community has its perks: Matty noticed many Lads PFPs submitting projects during hackathons and even more importantly, Armani and Tristan have been active mentors to founders backed through Colosseum’s accelerator

Want to learn more about their project ? https://x.com/colosseum

Phillip - Sei Foundation (Growth Lead)

Phillip leads growth at the Sei Foundation, where he focuses on supporting creators, driving adoption and helping the right people succeed across the ecosystem. He originally came from the world of private equity consulting but everything changed after he booked a last-minute ticket to first ever Solana Breakpoint event. That week of meeting builders and talking crypto hooked him on the ecosystem ever since and even landed him his first job on Solana. He then worked at Trader Joe (leading DEX on Avax) for a while

Sei is a high-performance L1 that combines the best of Ethereum and Solana, offering tools, speed, scalability and accessibility. Phillip now helps creators, founders and communities make the most of this infrastructure

The Sei Foundation is entering a major growth phase: native USDC is live, RWA infrastructure is rolling out with partners like Ondo and they recently became the most-used EVM chain by weekly active wallets. Up next? Sei Giga, their next upgrade unlocking over 5 gigagas/sec of throughput and enabling apps that feel like Web2… but fully on-chain

How did Phillip got into Mad Lads?

He’s been around since the early days, back when getting on the WL meant guessing animal sounds (yes, that era… blue ball PTSD included). From the start, it just felt different. The culture, the product, the quality of the members… he knew he wanted to be part of it

Since joining, Phillip has had meaningful conversations and collaborations through Mad Lads. He sees it as one of the rare places where people from different ecosystems are genuinely curious and eager to build together. The true definition of WAO

We’ll close with a quote directly from Phillip :

At Sei FDN, we're focused on identifying and accelerating the growth journey of newcomers to the ecosystem: founders, creators and teams with conviction. If that sounds like you, feel free to reach out to me. Always happy to connect!

Want to learn more about Sei ? https://x.com/SeiNetwork

WhiskyTitan - BAXUS

WhiskyTitan, known in real life as Tzvi Wiesel, is the co-founder and CEO of BAXUS and a true Real World Assets (RWA) maximalist. With BAXUS, he’s building the future of wine & spirits collecting, starting with their fully on-chain marketplace

WhiskyTitan first discovered the world of whiskey in NYC while working at a tasting event. Fast forward five years, while studying computer science, he came up with the wild idea of creating a digital marketplace for spirits, fully on-chain… and that’s how BAXUS was born!

At its core, BAXUS brings together crypto traders, degens, whiskey and wine enthusiasts and even non-crypto users by building the leading marketplace for wine and spirits

Since launch, over 150,000 users (most of them non-crypto native) have interacted with crypto for the first time and continue to use BAXUS to:

Track their collection
Track their wishlists
Buy & sell bottles

But BAXUS isn’t stopping there. Remember how WhiskyTitan is an RWA maximalist? Well BAXUS also launched a hardware device for distilleries, designed to transmit environmental barrel data directly to warehouses, powered by Helium

What’s next? Direct access to DeFi, so users/brands can leverage their bottles and barrels stored in BAXUS’ vault and unlock capital through on-chain lending

And how did WhiskyTitan got into Mad Lads?

He always admired Armani, loved the culture and was a fan of the art. Once he found the perfect Mad Lads for himself, he joined the community and never left

He values being part of the Mad Lads community which has given consistent support to BAXUS both as users and as voices on social media. WhiskyTitan is thinking about ways to create special experiences on BAXUS for the supportive Mad Lads community

We'll close with a quote directly from WhiskyTitan:

Lads are terminally online and always looking out for what they can do to make the ecosystem better. I love my lad and definitely want to create more opportunities for cool special events or releases to thank the lads for their support.

Fock it, we drink.

Want to learn more about their project ? https://x.com/BAXUSco

Amir - SolanaHub (Hubra)

Amir is a seasoned Solana developer and validator since 2020 and the mind behind SolanaHub. A true decentralization maxi and DeFi enthusiast, he’s been deeply involved in the ecosystem since he started

SolanaHub (soon to be rebranded as Hubra) reflects every pain point crypto has introduced: from confusing trends to unclear risks and limited accessibility. Amir believes crypto is incredibly powerful but still far too hard to follow and even harder to use safely
His mission with SolanaHub is simple: change that

He’s building a cross-platform experience that makes crypto simple, safe and rewarding. To achieve this, SolanaHub delivers features like:

Hot new tokens? They surface the trends
Crazy APY on a protocol? It’s on your radar
DeFi position in bad health? They alert you before it’s too late

Everything at SolanaHub is designed to help users stay informed, avoid scams and maximize upside without all the noise

Next up? They’re about to boost rewards for $hubSOL stakers (soon to be rebranded as well)

and how did Amir got into Mad Lads?

As soon as he saw the level of quality Mad Lads delivered to their community, he knew he had to be part of it. For him, it’s rare to find a group that preserves culture, builds with intention and holds the line on standards… all while rocking outstanding art

He’s confident that being part of the Mad Lads community will help his project grow because strong communities build strong ecosystems

We’ll close with a quote directly from Amir:

In my eyes, Mad Lads and other high-bar NFT communities represent the blueprint: exclusive but earned, creative but focused and driven by real value. I'm proud to be part of that energy.

Want to learn more about their project ? https://x.com/solanahubapp

sang.sol - Fragmetric

Sang is the co-founder of Fragmetric and a long-time DeFi builder, passionate about creating innovative financial infrastructure on Solana. Active in the ecosystem since 2021, he’s always been into financial products and Fragmetric is exactly that

Fragmetric is the first Liquid Restaking Protocol on Solana, designed to help users maximize yield through liquid restaking tokens like $fragSOL, $fragJTO and $fragBTC

That’s not all, Fragmetric also launched an NFT collection called Topu, which plays a key role in their governance and ecosystem development

The team is now working on a new product related to stablecoins, which should be announced very soon

How did Sang got into Mad Lads?

Joining Mad Lads felt like a logical step for Sang when he saw how thriving this community is. As someone deeply involved in Solana since 2021, becoming a Lad meant surrounding himself with other builders and value-driven individuals

Being part of the Mad Lads community has been a big boost for Sang and his team. Not only did they gain access to a hyper-engaged supporters (the MAD LADS), they also received valuable guidance and backing from Armani and Tristan, which led to a close collaboration with Backpack, opening doors to key insights and partnerships that accelerated Fragmetric’s growth

We’ll close with a quote directly from Sang :

WAO x STEM

Want to learn more about their project ? https://x.com/fragmetric

Ivan - Nomadz

Ivan is a true serial entrepreneur. He’s been building businesses almost since he started walking. From coffee shops to healthy food vending machines, tech startups and even an investment firm, Ivan has done it all. Today, he’s the co-founder of 3x Capital and co-founder of Nomadz

His web3 journey began as an investor, then expanded into a portfolio manager role and now he’s fully focused on Nomadz, a booking aggregator for Web3 travelers

When he’s not building, Ivan is organizing acceleration programs like Solana Temple, a wellness-focused bootcamp for founders, creators and investors which is now officially backed by the Solana Foundation. He also organized Solana Sailing, a week-long sailing experience bringing together founders and investors; Season 2 sets sail this September in the beautiful waters of Greece

Nomadz is a travel platform built for everyone, but especially Web3 travelers looking for better deals. It aggregates stays from over 320 providers and thanks to a smooth Backpack Exchange integration, users can pay with 0% off-ramp fees

Even better, Nomadz features a gamified system where users earn XP, unlock achievements and get rewards. Their Season 1 kicking off this summer

How did Ivan got into Mad Lads ?

Well, he fell in love with the Backpack team’s culture and vision for Solana. Many of his friends were already Lads, and eventually… he couldn’t resist the urge to scream WAO and Fock It right alongside them

Securing his Mad Lad wasn’t just a vibe decision, it was also a smart investment, and he’s convinced of the long-term value

Since joining, Ivan has:

Connected with top-tier devs
Found angel investors
Formed new partnerships
And seen his social engagement triple

We’ll close with a quote directly from Ivan:

MadLads on top!

Want to learn more about their project ? https://x.com/nomadz_co

Taras - Venture Launch

Taras Yavorskyy is a partner at 3x Capital, an early-stage investment firm, and also a partner at Venture Launch, an acceleration and fundraising platform for Web3 startups
In short? Taras is the go-to guy for entrepreneurs launching products in the Solana ecosystem

So what does it actually mean to be a partner at Venture Launch?
Well, Venture Launch is designed to help founders raise capital and grow fast while also giving investors and VCs early access to top-tier Web3 deals in the Solana ecosystem

Their goal are simple:

Help 100+ Solana-based projects raise their pre-seed and seed rounds
Support them in building great products
Scale real user adoption

Taras got into Mad Lads because, for him, it represents a real community. One built on shared values, support, and a collective motivation to build great things

Being part of Mad Lads has helped him:

Build his branding
Access talent and form partnerships
Stay close to the most active builders in the space

We’ll close with a quote directly from Taras :

Solana isn’t just hype. It’s one of the few ecosystems with real users, real builders, and real value.

https://x.com/tarasss13/status/1912159014722625805

Want to learn more about their project ? https://x.com/venture_launch

0xBeni - SOLYD

0xBeni is the chief storyteller behind the SOLYD brand and one of the core team members of Solana Hungary. He joined the Solana ecosystem 3 years ago and has always had a deep interest in DeFi and DePIN

SOLYD is what drives Beni, a DePIN project creating premium phone cases for the Solana Seeker phone. SOLYD is much more than just a phone cases brand it's a platform for creators, communities and brands who want to establish their physical presence on the most sold web3 device (over 150K units sold)

So, what makes a SOLYD case different from your average phone case?
Each one comes with a Soulbound Token that grants holders access to rewards and perks across the ecosystem.

Their first major achievement? They literally sent the first Solana phone into space and did a transaction from up there! They are now getting ready to ship all pre-ordered phone cases by the end of summer aswell as prepping for a special “SOLYD September” drop full of surprises

So how did Beni end up a Mad Lad?

Well, many of his close friends were already Lads, and he had noticed the strong presence of Mad Lads across the ecosystem for over two years. During Solana APEX, he even helped organize a Backpack meetup, where he met a bunch of Lads IRL and that’s what gave him the confidence to pull the trigger

Since joining, Beni has really enjoyed Mad News and the Mad Lads Hub. He’s received a ton of valuable feedback for SOLYD from other Lads and now he’s exploring ways to further amplify our collective impact… maybe even with a Mad Lads phone case?