SOL Strategies buys Solana privacy startup Darklake as it expands beyond treasury operations

SOL Strategies said Tuesday it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the assets of Darklake Labs, a Solana-native zero-knowledge startup, for $1.2 million, bringing privacy-focused execution technology and a new research team into the company.

The consideration includes $200,000 in cash and $1 million in common shares, with the stock portion subject to a four-month lockup.

Darklake developed Zyga, a zero-knowledge proof system built for Solana that is designed to enable private transaction execution while reducing front-running and sandwich attacks at the point of execution. SOL Strategies said Darklake placed second in the DeFi track of the Solana Radar Global Hackathon, was accepted into the Colosseum Accelerator, and has academic research partnerships in Brazil, with a patent application in process.

The acquisition also brings in Darklake’s core team. SOL Strategies said Darklake CEO and technical founder Vitor Py Braga, who previously worked in infrastructure engineering roles at Meta and IBM, is expected to join alongside co-founder and COO Amber Hales, who has compliance experience from Coinbase and Coincover, and Tiago Alves, Darklake’s head of ZK research and a university professor.

The strategic angle is broader than a small acqui-hire. Chief executive Michael Hubbard said the purchase is part of SOL Strategies’ move toward a more active role in technology development within the Solana economy.

The timing is notable because SOL Strategies has been scaling both its balance sheet exposure to Solana and its validator business. In its March 2026 monthly update, the company reported treasury holdings of 533,040 SOL, including liquid staked SOL, valued at about $43.9 million using SOL’s April 1 price. The same update showed 3,813,468 SOL in assets under delegation and 768,022 SOL staked in STKESOL, its liquid staking product.

The company has also been working to broaden institutional access to its staking infrastructure. In March, Balance integrated SOL Strategies’ validator as a Solana staking provider for custody clients. SOL Strategies also said ARK Invest’s Digital Asset Revolutions Fund selected it as a Solana staking provider.