From Quantum Labs to Wall Street: Inside the 50-Person Startup Behind Equity Product xStocks

xStocks:- Backed, the company founded by former quantum physicist Adam Levi, has been making waves amid the growing trend of tokenized equities.

Founded in 2021, the startup has signed partnerships with leading crypto exchanges such as Kraken, Bybit, Crypto.com, as well as blockchains like Solana and BNB Chain, among other major players.

At the center of these partnerships is its flagship RWA product, xStocks, which went live on June 30. The platform enables users to trade tokenized equities – such as Microsoft, Apple, and ETFs – directly from their partnered exchange accounts.

The rising popularity of xStocks is evident in on-chain data from Solana: the number of wallets holding xStocks jumped from just 4,400 on July 3 to over 33,300 by July 5.

Demand of Backed’s xStocks on Solana | Source: X PostAlso Read: xStocks Expand to Solana

Backed: The Startup Born From DAOstack’s Lessons

xStocks and its creator Backed have caught news headlines in the past month only. However, Dr. Adam Levi, the Co-founder and CTO of Backed has been working on his vision of tokenizing equities – Backed – for the past 4 years. Dr. Levi caught this trend four years ago when he saw stablecoins or the tokenized dollar gaining momentum.

He holds a Ph.D. in Theoretical Physics from Technion with research on quantum effects near black holes.

In an interview, he explained that the reason why tokenized equities are now gaining momentum is because “people understand that after stablecoins, this is the next game and it is being seen as the best way to scale crypto.” He also believes that the adoption has something to do with the generational change as well. For today’s generation, “Trading tokens is the way for them to own financial stocks unlike previous ones who preferred Bank notes and real stocks.”

As per company’s official website, Backed’s other two co-founders are:-

2. Yehonatan Goldman (COO) who holds a Master’s in Cultural Heritage Conservation. He founded an art gallery, and worked as a project manager.

3. Roberto Klein, the Legal Lead who holds both a B.S. and M.S. from Tel Aviv University and works on legal and regulatory expertise

It is interesting to note that all the three founders of Backed have previously worked at DAOstack – the DAO infrastructure platform. However, the trio’s decentralized coordination operating system failed miserably in 2020 with the token GEN coming to zero liquidity. Now, the team has returned under their new project Backed and is making waves in the tokenized space.

Behind the minds of 50 People

The Backed team is scaling globally on the back of just 30-50 employees with mainly focuses on legal compliances and technical developments.

As the distinguished element, Backed involves leadership roles such as Growth Manager given to aspiring ones who do not really show much experience in crypto. This strategy by the start-up has perhaps helped it in bringing fresh perspectives and breaking the traditional mechanisms.

Its Software Team Leader Nata Naradotski has his prior stint only at one firm, Sisense. Its Community and Growth Head Andre P. also does not shows any critical experiences or engagements with crypto.

Though its all three co-founders are Israelies, the company’s headquarters are based in Zug,Switzerland – one of the most crypto-friendly and well-regulated jurisdictions in the world.

Whats Next for the Pioneering Player

Currently, xStocks is functioning as a tokenized equities product by Backed Finance and is listed on platforms like Kraken, Bybit, and in Solana DeFi (Raydium, Jupiter, Kamino). It currently includes only 60 tokenized equities and is expected to expand beyong it in near future.

But based on recent updates, the official xStocks website now says “Dashboard Coming Soon”. This strongly suggests that xStocks is developing into a standalone platform or portal.

While not officially confirmed, based on Backed’s roadmap and DeFi trends, the xStocks dashboard might allow the users to manage all their tokenized equity assets under one place. This may include Portfolio tracking, On-chain trading UI, Bridge options (Solana to BNB, etc.), Asset minting/redemption tools for institutions and Analytics on tokenized stock performance.

Thus, with no doubt Backed is leading the race where its competitors are the likes of established players such as Robinhood and novices like Gemini partner Dinari. However, the tokenized equity space is set to turn more competitive, in turn, pushing the 50 minds of Backed to work beyond their limits.