Perceptron raises $6.5M to build decentralized AI data network

Perceptron said it closed a $6.5 million strategic funding round backed by Sigma Capital, Selini Capital, trading firms and other Web3 investors to expand decentralized AI data infrastructure. The company said the capital will support the launch of its data-questing platform, new tools for contributors and an incentive and rewards program, while helping it scale its network to 5 million nodes. The project is positioning itself as a marketplace for AI training data, where community members contribute verified real-world data and AI companies can request tailored datasets for delivery within days. Perceptron says that model offers an alternative to centralized scraping infrastructure by letting contributors retain ownership of their data and share in earnings. Peter Anthony, co-founder and CEO of Perceptron, said the company aims to build "the world’s first decentralized AI data mesh" and argued the network has already demonstrated traction by scaling to hundreds of thousands of nodes organically. The startup said this was its biggest and widest funding round to date. It was incubated in the Colloseum ecosystem, and in June 2025 Blockmesh merged with Perceptron Network to form the current project. Perceptron also said early demand is visible in initial data-questing activity, with live data agents reaching more than 200,000 users across Telegram and Discord communities. The platform reported 300,000 daily active users and 807,000 active nodes. The network is now in a pre-airdrop stage designed to encourage on-chain usage (activity recorded on a blockchain). Perceptron said a widely circulated NFT (digital ownership token) screenshot was fake on social media, though users had been able to acquire NFTs before the Perceptron Network rebrand as part of the legacy Blockmesh project. It said future point allocations will depend on contributions, internet contribution, network participation and other activity, and that PERC tokens will be airdropped to high-trust network members as the TGE (token generation event) approaches.