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Champ Titles Raised $18M from Point72 Ventures
Champ Titles Raised $18M from Point72 Ventures

Architect Partners was the exclusive Financial Advisor to Champ Titles.

Transaction Overview

On March 27, 2024, Cleveland-based digital title and registration platform Champ Titles announced an $18 million Series C equity round led by Point72 Ventures with participation by existing investors.

Company Description

Champ Titles provides a digital title and registration suite to streamline the vehicle titling process. Their platform enables the creation of legal, digital titles for easy transfer and verification, serving insurance carriers, lenders, state governments, auto dealers, and owners. Stakeholders, including state motor vehicle departments, lenders, and vehicle owners, benefit from a unified and transparent system, where all information is readily accessible and transaction times are markedly reduced. The governance of the digital platform is established through clear guidelines, ensuring all parties adhere to the updated processes and regulations.

Champ Titles’ success is measured by the elimination of more than 5 million pieces of paper annually on average per state; a reduction in processing time from 40-60 days to a matter of hours; increased productivity of DMV title clerks processing more than five times as many titles per day; and the improved experience for consumers in each state that has adopted Champ Titles’ solutions. Over the last twelve months, the company has successfully onboarded new states including New Jersey, Kentucky, and Illinois, and expanded its relationship with West Virginia by creating the first National Digital Titling Clearinghouse (NDTC). Through these efforts, the company has grown rapidly with revenue increasing by more than 300% year over year. 

Founded in 2018 by CEO, Shane Bigelow, the company now has 63 employees and is headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio. 

Funding

In this Series C funding round, Champ Titles raised $18M from Point72 Ventures and existing investors including W.R. Berkley Corporation, Eos Venture Partners, Guidewire Software, and Rev1 Ventures, bringing the total amount raised since inception to $45M. 

In the prior Series B round, Champ Titles raised $13M from Guidewire Software, Eos Venture Partners, and Ally Ventures.

Before that, Champ Titles raised $13.5M in 2021 in a Series A. Emergents, now Architect Partners, served as the exclusive Financial Advisor for that financing. 

Competition

Champ Titles’ biggest competitors are existing state DMVs deciding to be a software company and developing solutions on their own or via large systems developers.  However, they also compete with other digital title networks such as Cario and Oxhead Alpha/Tezos. In addition, technology-enabled DMV solutions such as Fast Enterprises are seen as competitive but don’t offer the same efficacy.

 

Architect Partners’ Perspective

Champ Titles’ SaaS-based solutions present a compelling example of blockchain-enabled infrastructure solving real-world problems.  By focusing on the needs and pain points of legacy auto title, registration, and lien processing, Champ has leveraged the power of blockchain to transform critical government services.  The result is exponentially accelerated processing time for DMV constituents, with improved accuracy and reduced cost.  Yet Champ’s solutions capture many key benefits of on-chain data processing – which include trust, transparency, data integrity, security, and efficiency – without users even being aware of their blockchain foundations.  

While much attention is focused on recent resilience in crypto asset prices, we believe 2024 will see significant growth in non-speculative enterprise applications for distributed ledger technology.  Champ’s successful raise demonstrates investor interest in practical and scalable solutions to real-world problems.

Financing

Week of May 26 – Jun 01

Todd White
June 04, 2025
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May 26 – June 01 (Published June 4th)

PERSPECTIVES by Todd White

 

32 Crypto Private Financings Raised: $526.3M

Rolling 3-Month-Average: $530.6M

Rolling 52-Week Average: $274.5M

 

The adoption of crypto-treasury strategies (where companies allocate a portion of their balance sheet to digital assets like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, and even stablecoins) has accelerated since 2021, with both tech giants and smaller firms participating. This trend has the potential to reshape corporate finance, but it also brings significant risks.

 

Several prominent companies have pioneered or adopted crypto-treasury strategies, most focused on Bitcoin. Strategy (fka MicroStrategy) is the most notable example and now holds the largest Bitcoin treasury among public companies, with 580,955 BTC as of June 2025, purchased at an average price of $70,023. The company began aggressively accumulating BTC in 2020 under CEO Michael Saylor, who views Bitcoin as a superior store of value and has emerged as a vocal advocate for Bitcoin as a treasury asset. Other groups focused on Bitcoin treasuries include miner Marathon Digital, which accumulates and retains BTC as part of its core mining activities; LatAm fintech giant MercadoLibre, which integrates crypto into its payment ecosystem and uses its crypto holdings for transactions in addition to holding the assets on its balance sheet; and 21 Capital, a newly formed Bitcoin-native financial company created by Tether, Bitfinex, and SoftBank through a reverse merger with Cantor Equity Partners, Inc. (CEP), a Nasdaq-listed special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) sponsored by Cantor Fitzgerald, and positioned to be led by Jack Mallers, a prominent Bitcoin advocate and CEO of Strike.

 

Other assets are also being utilized, including ETH, SOL, and XRP. SharpLink Gaming, a Nasdaq-listed marketing company servicing the online sports-betting and gaming sectors, is emerging as a leading advocate for Ethereum-based treasury strategies with its announced $425 million PIPE financing this week in order to acquire Ethereum as the company’s primary treasury-reserve asset. There are numerous other examples; by our count, at least 36 groups have announced crypto-based treasury ambitions over just the last few months.

 

Amid this surge, there are, of course, numerous advocates and skeptics alike. Advocates often cite several putative benefits, including the potential for high returns, hedging against inflation and currency debasement, portfolio diversification, and even strategic branding as an innovative company. Detractors quickly counter with the risks of extreme volatility, uncertain regulatory and accounting treatment, inherent security and custody challenges, operational complexities, and more.

 

However the debate unfolds, the public markets appear to approve for the moment. Investors currently trade crypto-treasury companies at a notable premium, between two and three times the price of the underlying asset. Most adopters, SharpLink included, intend to continue operating their core businesses rather than pivot entirely to crypto accumulation. Even 21 Capital, launched on the basis of its BTC strategy, intends to complement its treasury activity by developing a suite of BTC-enabled financial products that will provide a core level of business activity. Strategy, on the other hand, has pivoted to an almost pure treasury play.

 

Whether, and when, the music will stop and the trading premium diminishes (or worse) remains to be seen. For now, momentum seems to be increasing, and we will track the relative wisdom or folly of this growing cohort with keen interest.

 

Contact ryan@architectpartners.com to schedule a meeting.