EXCLUSIVE: Obex unveils first cohort deploying $1B to bring yield onchain

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It’s rare to see billions of dollars being deployed into any business that’s not AI these days. 

But that’s not stopping everyone. Obex, an incubator administered by Framework Ventures and backed by a $2.5 billion mandate from the Sky ecosystem, today revealed its first cohort of eight incubated projects: Maple Finance, USD.ai, Daylight, Centrifuge, Securitize, River, TVL Capital, and Better.

“Our industry is at an inflection point,” said Parker Edwards, partner at Framework Ventures, during an exclusive interview on Token Relations’ Talking Tokens podcast. “We’re moving beyond circular DeFi yield sources and toward high-quality yield from private credit markets, fintech, energy infrastructure, AI capex, real estate, and other productive sectors.”

For years, much of decentralized finance relied on what insiders refer to as “circular yield,” where returns are generated largely from crypto-native activity like trading, leverage, and token incentives. 

But that model is changing.

“For the first time, we have assets [with real cash flow] coming onchain,” Edwards said. “We’re not having to go and incentivize depositors with yield that isn’t actually generated from the assets themselves.”

Obex will be deploying $1 billion across the eight projects. Some capital is already flowing in, and roughly $600 million has been deployed into Maple’s lending ecosystem, Edwards said, and expects the investment to scale further.

The focus on scale is deliberate. One of the biggest limitations of real-world assets (RWAs) has been the inability to match institutional demand with sufficient liquidity. That’s why the incubator is deploying $2.5 billion into such yield opportunities, Edwards said. 

Major investment firms like Apollo and JP Morgan are already experimenting with tokenized funds and structured products, often alongside platforms like Securitize and Centrifuge. Within the Sky ecosystem alone, over $1 billion has been deployed into asset managers, according to Edwards.

At the center of this strategy is USDS, Sky’s stablecoin, which Edwards says is meant to be less  a payments tool and more a yield-bearing savings product. 

Sky generated  annualized revenue of $435 million in 2025, and is targeting USDS supply to reach more than $20 billion this year. Obex is designed to help fuel that growth by sourcing and scaling new yield opportunities.

“My goal for Sky is to make USDS growth look like a hockey stick,” Edwards said.

The timing for this scale also comes as the mix of market participants changes rapidly. The stablecoin market went from 90% retail and 10% institutional, to 90% institutional and 10% retail, Edwards said. 

That influx of institutional capital and investors can push the ecosystem toward more sustainable, cash-flow models. If successful, Edwards thinks, Obex and its cohorts could become a bridge for how capital flows between traditional finance and crypto, as an incubator and distribution engine for onchain yield.

Check out the next section for more details and the full episode.

For today’s episode, I interviewed Parker Edwards, partner at Framework Ventures, about deploying a $2.5 billion mandate to bring institutional-grade yield onchain through Obex, a Sky-focused incubator. Parker announces the first cohort where it’s deploying $1 billion across eight companies including Maple, Centrifuge, Securitize, River, and Better Home & Finance, spanning areas like structured credit, mortgages, energy, and AI infrastructure.

He explains why real-world assets are finally reaching institutional scale, with players like Apollo and BlackRock actively participating. The conversation covers why established companies with deep domain expertise are better positioned to scale with Obex than early-stage startups, how Sky grew to $11.5 billion in USDS stablecoin supply, and the plan to hit $20 billion by 2026.

This episode is sponsored by Securitize, the proven leader in tokenized funds, equities, and private markets. Discover more at securitize.io.

TIMESTAMPS 

00:00 – Intro with Parker Edwards, partner at Framework Ventures

00:25 – What is Obex and its $2.5 billion mandate to deploy capital into Sky ecosystem

01:09 – Sky's growth to $11.5 billion in stablecoin supply as third largest stablecoin

02:06 – Why Framework Ventures is administering the Obex incubator

02:52 – First cohort: Maple, USD.ai, Centrifuge, Securitize, River, Better, and others deploying $1 billion

04:12 – Why it chose more established players over early-stage startups for day-one scale

06:06 – State of RWAs: institutional-grade founders with deep domain expertise entering the space

08:03 – Asset manager mandates: structured credit, private credit, energy, and AI infrastructure

10:05 – Why Better Home & Finance chose to build on Sky for mortgage tokenization

13:33 – Real cash-flowing assets onchain without artificial yield incentives

15:15 – How DeFi is competing with banks and credit funds on quality assets

17:13 – Apollo and BlackRock participating onchain

20:16 – Sky's recent $435 million revenue and $20 billion stablecoin target by end of 2026

22:20 – Why USDS won't replace USDC or USDT but serves different institutional roles

27:26 – Final advice

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