Newzchain Exclusive is where we go beyond the buzzwords and bring you closer to the builders shaping the crypto world from the ground up. Each week, we feature one story that deserves your attention, not because it’s hyped, but because it’s building something that matters.

This week, we caught up with Venkat Kunisetty, founder of Unwrap Labs, a lean but sharp decentralized finance (DeFi) outfit based out of Bengaluru. At its core, Unwrap Labs is trying to make DeFi less intimidating, more usable, and actually rewarding for users.

Whether it’s staking STRK without the wait, automating complex yield strategies, or making bridging feel invisible, there’s a quiet confidence in how they’re building.

But where did it all begin, and what keeps the engine running in a space that rarely sits still? To learn just that, we spoke to Venkat, and he unpacked the journey, the grit, and the product thinking behind it all.

Turning Pain Points into Products

For Venkat, who is better known in Web3 circles as Akira, the journey into building Unwrap Labs was less about chasing trends and more about solving personal pain points. 

“I used to run arbitrage bots back in college,” he recalls. “I’ve always been interested in finding the best yields across traditional and decentralized finance.”

Today, that personal obsession has grown into Unwrap Labs, a Bengaluru-based DeFi startup focused on building on Starknet. The team is deliberately lean, just five members, but their ambition is anything but small.

Their flagship product, Endur, solves a core problem in staking: liquidity. It converts staked STRK into xSTRK, a liquid token that earns staking rewards but remains usable across DeFi platforms. 

Native unstaking on Starknet typically takes 21 days, but with Endur, users can unstake within hours. More importantly, xSTRK can be used as collateral, unlocking value even while assets are staked.

Then there’s Troves, which takes the headache out of yield farming. Users can access complex, optimized strategies—like leverage loops and liquidity rebalancing—with a single click, without needing to understand the math behind them.

And finally, EasyLeap, which directly tackles one of DeFi’s biggest UX problems: bridging.

“Having to visit multiple websites just to use one DeFi app kills user adoption—that’s what EasyLeap solves,” Venkat explains. 

The tool embeds bridging directly into applications, removing unnecessary steps and friction.

Unwrap Labs Is Playing the Long Game

Unwrap Labs isn’t just building on Starknet—it’s betting on it. For Venkat, the choice of this Ethereum Layer 2 isn’t just a technical decision, but a strategic one. 

“Starknet is a highly scalable, future-ready L2,” he says. “With features like transaction multi-call, negligible gas fees, and high throughput, it gives us the flexibility to ship faster and build better.”

That speed of execution shows. In less than two years, the team has crossed several notable milestones. Their flagship product, Endur, hit an all-time high of 52 million STRK in total value locked (TVL), and now supports integrations across seven different DeFi platforms. 

The platform has onboarded over 10,000 user accounts and is on track to generate $100,000 in projected revenue this year, no small feat for a lean, grant-supported team.

But Venkat’s ambitions go far beyond these early wins. In the short term, the team is laser-focused on scaling their two live products: pushing Endur’s TVL to $100 million and getting Troves to $2 million in deposits. 

Long-term, the roadmap gets even bolder, becoming the go-to platform for liquid staking both STRK and BTC, while also building enduring one-click DeFi strategies that serve real user needs.

There’s also an eye on speed and innovation. 

“We want to incorporate AI into our development cycle to ship more and faster.”

Speed, Grit, and Distribution

At the heart of Unwrap Labs is a builder culture rooted in speed, user empathy, and clarity of execution. 

“We ship fast,” Venkat says, “but we also make sure our contracts are audited and that we’re talking to our users constantly.” 

That feedback loop has shaped not just the products but also the way the team prioritizes what to build next.

Of course, building in crypto, especially without VC backing, comes with its own challenges. For Venkat and the team, it’s been a balancing act between product, talent, and distribution. 

“Being bootstrapped has taught us to think from a business perspective in crypto, which not a lot of projects do,” he reflects. 

Finding the right developers and keeping pace with an ever-changing tech stack wasn’t easy, but years in the Starknet ecosystem helped him assemble what he calls “cracked devs who ship every day.”

If there’s one hard-earned lesson Venkat swears by, it’s this: a good product alone won’t cut it. 

“Good product + great distribution = WAGMI. Great product + okay distribution = NGMI.” 

In a space powered by digital communities, showing up on X, listening, and adapting have been key.

His advice to other founders is that “don’t overthink launch”. Talk to users early, build fast, and always think about distribution. Sometimes what you think will help the user actually doesn’t. You only find out by putting it out there.

Edited by Harshajit Sarmah