From Stealth to Industry Spotlight: How Citrea Launched Bitcoin’s First Zero-Knowledge Rollup with Galaxy Ventures’ Platform
At Galaxy Ventures, we view our Platform as an extension of your founding team; a force multiplier designed to help you scale faster and smarter. We partner with founders and their teams on the most critical levers of company-building: sharpening your brand and narrative, generating meaningful press, recruiting senior leaders who can change your trajectory, and shaping go-to-market strategies that win. Beyond that, we open doors into Galaxy’s full ecosystem which includes staking, lending, protocol strategy, product development, treasury management, M&A, events, and a global network of partners and operators.
What is Citrea?
Citrea, built by Chainway Labs, is Bitcoin’s first zero-knowledge (ZK) rollup. It brings Ethereum-level programmability to Bitcoin while preserving Bitcoin’s security and decentralization. Citrea’s core thesis is simple: Bitcoin can do more. By addressing Bitcoin’s scalability limitations and combining EVM-equivalent execution with BitVM-based settlement, Citrea expands Bitcoin’s utility beyond transfers and enables developers to build full-scale applications on the network.
Unlike other Bitcoin scaling solutions that rely on centralized bridges or independent consensus mechanisms with their own validator sets, Citrea introduces a modular ZK rollup that uses Bitcoin as its settlement layer, directly inheriting its security properties. Through its BitVM2-based bridge, Clementine, Citrea guarantees that BTC on Citrea is secured by the Bitcoin Network, enabling trust-minimized transfers between Bitcoin and Citrea. Developers who know Ethereum's EVM can build on Citrea without learning new languages or tooling, allowing them to tap into Bitcoin’s liquidity with full programmability.
In late 2023, Galaxy Ventures led Citrea’s $2.7 million seed round and began work supporting Citrea with our Venture Platform.
The Challenge
At the end of 2023, Citrea was still in stealth mode. They hadn’t developed or shipped a name, website, brand, or narrative, and were working through launch strategy. While the technical foundation was strong, the team needed help translating deep engineering into a brand narrative that resonated with developers, investors, key hires, and media.
As Orkun put it, "Our biggest challenge wasn't the technology, it was marketing it in a way that resonated across the ecosystem."
Citrea’s founding team and lead marketer turned to the Galaxy Ventures Platform team to help address challenges such as:
Crafting strategic messaging, positioning, and storylines that would create impact on launch
Building a visual brand identity that would stand out
Establishing a strong press presence around differentiated storytelling and content
Hiring key roles (later on, after the launch)
The Galaxy Ventures Platform Execution
“Partnering with the Galaxy Platform team transformed our launch strategy from concept to reality. Their expertise in messaging, PR, and design played a crucial role in shaping our brand's voice and ensuring it reached the right ears. Professional, creative, and always on the ball, they've been invaluable to our launch's success.”
- Orkun Kilic, CEO and Cofounder
Communications & Marketing | CJ Huntzinger
We partnered closely with the Citrea team and lead marketer to develop their core narrative, positioning, and messaging. This work became the foundation for the public launch, which included:
Running a messaging and positioning workshop
Creating the press release, blog post, and social content aligned to the new brand + story
Media strategy and pitching that landed coverage around the Seed Funding announcement and out-of-stealth launch in CoinDesk, CoinTelegraph, Unchained, The Defiant, Axios Pro Rata, Fortune Term Sheet, and more
Ongoing support post-launch and working with the Citrea team to write and pitch follow-up announcements such as Citrea’s Clementine Bridge, Series A fundraise, and BitVM2 on Bitcoin Testnet, all of which were covered exclusively by CoinDesk with follow-on trade outlet coverage
Citrea Coverage Secured by Galaxy Ventures Platform:
We also amplified Citrea’s presence by co-hosting events with them at Bitcoin Vegas and Bitcoin Nashville, as well as having Galaxy's Head of Firm Research, Alex Thorn, host Orkun on the Galaxy Research podcast, Galaxy Brains.
Brand & Design | Lukas Kmoth
Citrea had initially partnered with an external design agency to develop its visual identity and name, but the outcome lacked cohesion. Lukas, the design lead on our Galaxy Ventures Platform team, reworked the entire design system to add polish and precision. He introduced new colors, better visuals, and a unifying framework. In Orkun’s words, "What we had was decent. Lukas made it exceptional."
Talent & Hiring | Jules Nguyen
Recruiting senior talent is a common challenge for startups, and Citrea was no exception. While they had a strong pipeline for engineers, they struggled with senior level hiring and were overspending on external vendors. One critical gap was legal: they had no in-house counsel and were incurring significant fees from outside law firms. Bringing on a General Counsel would reduce costs and centralize legal decision-making.
The GC role had unique constraints. The ideal candidate needed unique experience setting up business entities, strong crypto knowledge, and overlap with Citrea's Turkey-based founders’ working hours (narrowing the pool to East Coast candidates). Citrea also preferred NYC-based talent to support the launch of their new NYC office, but top law firm candidates in the region often commanded compensation well beyond Citrea’s startup budget.
Jules Nguyen, Platform Talent Lead at Galaxy Ventures, stepped in to lead a fast and targeted search. Rather than relying on traditional channels, she embedded herself in the local legal ecosystem, joining the crypto social network Farcaster and attending in-person law meetups. At one of these events, she met Ari, a crypto attorney at top law firm, McDermott Will & Emery, with some rare experience and a genuine interest in crypto.
Jules built a strong relationship with Ari and positioned Citrea’s equity upside and long-term vision to close him for the role. Ari quickly became Citrea’s first in-house legal hire and one of their most senior additions to date, all of which was done with no recruiting agency spend. The initial candidate intake to signed offer took just 32 days, with Ari starting two weeks later. This timeline was 2–3x faster than typical GC searches, which often take at least 3-4 months. Because of his crypto fluency and domain expertise, Ari required minimal onboarding time and made an immediate impact. As cofounder Murat shared: “I can easily say we increased our 3x–4x legal output.”
The hire saved Citrea time, cost, and delivered immediate operational leverage in a critical function.
The Galaxy Ventures Platform Difference
By working with our Galaxy Ventures Platform, Citrea’s trajectory was faster, smoother, and more confident. "There was a clear difference between what we had planned and what we actually executed after your support. That delta was massive," Orkun added.
While a lot of firms offer generalist advice, we aim to engage like an operating partner within the strategy and desires of the portfolio company. The support we work to provide isn’t just about financial cost savings, but savings on time alongside an incentive alignment model that always puts the portfolio company first. "The support was money-equivalent, if not more," Orkun emphasized. "It saved us time, budget, and guesswork."
“Partnering with Galaxy has been the best thing that’s happened to us! Galaxy is not just a financial supporter; their platform team is extremely hands-on. They have been directly contributing to our branding, marketing efforts, hiring, and strategy. We are grateful to have them.”
- Orkun Kilic, CEO and Cofounder
For founders building the future: Citrea’s story is proof that with the right partner, your vision can break through the noise and scale faster than you thought possible. If you would like Galaxy Ventures’ support in building, let’s talk.
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