Catena Labs Launches with Backing from Tom Brady and a16z

Tom Brady is stepping back into crypto—this time with a much more measured approach. After his high-profile involvement with FTX ended in controversy, Brady is now lending his support to Catena Labs, a Boston-based startup looking to combine artificial intelligence and finance in a new way.

Good to know

• Catena Labs just raised $18 million in seed funding, led by a16zcrypto.
• The company plans to use stablecoins like USDC to enable AI-led transactions.
• Its open-source toolkit, Agent Commerce Kit, is built for autonomous financial activity.

Catena Labs has officially emerged from stealth, aiming to create what it calls the world’s first AI-native financial institution. The startup was co-founded by Sean Neville, known for co-creating the USDC stablecoin at Circle. Catena’s central idea revolves around agentic commerce—where AI agents can act independently on behalf of users to carry out transactions.

Backing from Andreessen Horowitz’s crypto division led the $18 million seed round, which also included investments from Circle Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Stanford Engineering Venture Fund, and Breyer Capital. Well-known figures such as Balaji Srinivasan, Kevin Lin, and Bradley Horowitz also participated as angel investors.

Now, with a project backed by Circle’s co-founder and several heavyweight venture firms, Brady appears to be betting on a more regulated and tech-forward path.

What Catena Labs Is Building

According to Neville, Catena’s goal is to help AI agents, and the users they represent, transact efficiently and securely. The company envisions a future where AI agents interact directly with financial systems. To support this, Catena has launched the Agent Commerce Kit, an open-source toolkit that enables AI systems to confirm their identity and make payments on their own.

The company believes that many current financial infrastructures—whether in logistics, retail, or finance—are not built to support autonomous AI tools. By integrating regulated stablecoins like USDC, Catena aims to create a new type of payment infrastructure that bridges both traditional and AI-driven systems.

Tom Brady’s Cautious Return

Brady’s involvement with Catena Labs marks a return to crypto for the NFL legend, though this time with more caution. His previous crypto experience was through FTX, the exchange that collapsed in 2022 and left billions in customer funds unaccounted for. The fallout from that event triggered a long stretch of instability across the digital asset industry.