YOAKE entertainment Raises $3.2M Led by Sony Innovation Fund to Scale Record Protocol on Soneium

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YOAKE entertainment, the company behind Record Protocol, has closed a $3.2 million (500M JPY) funding round led exclusively by Sony Innovation Fund (SIF), strengthening its position at the forefront of onchain entertainment. The raise will help expand Record’s role as core IPFi (Intellectual Properties Finance) infrastructure on Soneium and accelerate adoption across multiple entertainment sectors.

The Funding Round and Strategic Partnership

YOAKE entertainment announced that Sony Innovation Fund led the entire $3.2M round, underscoring a strong strategic alignment around onchain entertainment and fandom-powered IP finance. In addition to the investment, Record is deepening its collaboration with Sony Block Solutions Labs Pte. Ltd (SBSL), which will act as a key contributor to the ecosystem.

This partnership is described as a major step toward bridging traditional IPs with blockchain and crypto, positioning Record as an open infrastructure layer for entertainment fandoms. By working closely with Sony-aligned entities and the Soneium ecosystem, Record aims to bring mainstream entertainment properties and their fans into an onchain environment.

IPFi Powered by Fandom

Record targets a long-standing gap in the entertainment economy: traditional models capture value from IP distribution but fail to recognize or reward the huge non-monetary contributions of fandoms. Community building, content sharing, and cultural amplification on social platforms often go unseen and uncompensated, despite being critical to IP growth.

To address this, Record turns fandom contributions into a verifiable onchain asset class. By converting invisible passion into measurable demand signals, Record lays the foundation for IPFi powered by fandom. In this model, the REC token financializes these verifiable contributions, enabling a new market where “fandom capital” emerges as a liquid asset tied directly to the growth of intellectual properties. This structure ensures fandoms can share in the value they help create.

Real-World Adoption: IRC APP and Major Idol IPs

IRC APP serves as the official onchain application for IDOL RUNWAY COLLECTION Supported by TGC (IRC), Japan’s largest idol and fashion festival. The app uses Generative AI to evaluate fandom activities, leverages Record Protocol to verify fandom support onchain, and then rewards fans with exclusive official experiences and access.

This model has successfully onboarded fandoms onchain purely through their love for their favorite IPs, without depending on speculative crypto rewards. The legitimacy of this approach is reinforced by the caliber of idol groups already integrated into the Record Ecosystem through IRC APP, including:

• AKB48: Over 60 million singles sold and more than 60 #1 hits on the Oricon charts.

• Nogizaka46: Over 30 million album sales and international concerts in France, Singapore, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Taiwan.

• FRUITS ZIPPER: A hit song with 3 billion TikTok views and 64 million YouTube views, plus a Tokyo Dome performance in February 2026.

• CANDY TUNE: A hit track with 100 million streams and 9 weeks at #1 on the TikTok charts.

• CUTIE STREET: Debut song with over 200 million streams and a total of 7 billion TikTok views.

These integrations demonstrate that direct collaboration with official IP is key to onboarding mass fandoms onchain. By offering exclusive experiences and recognition not just token rewards Record has been able to build a sustainable, engaged user base, positioning this raise as one of the notable developments in Crypto Fundraising in January 2026.

Scaling IPFi Infrastructure on Soneium

With fresh capital and deepening ties to Sony-affiliated entities, Record is accelerating its integration as foundational IPFi infrastructure for the Soneium network. The vision is to position Record as a universal open protocol for the global entertainment economy, spanning music, idols, fashion, and eventually other IP verticals.

By aligning with diverse entertainment content worldwide, Record aims to build scalable infrastructure that can support a broad ecosystem of creators, rights holders, and fans. Over time, the goal is to extend beyond the idol sector into a wider range of IP categories, establishing REC as a cross-sector economic standard for IPFi.

In this framework, fandom contributions across different media and formats can be consistently recorded, recognized, and rewarded onchain. The result is a unified economy where passion and engagement become measurable assets across multiple entertainment franchises.

Leadership Perspectives

Sony Ventures Corporation and YOAKE entertainment highlighted the strategic importance of this collaboration for the future of entertainment and onchain fandom.

Kaz Hadano, CEO at Sony Ventures Corporation, commented: YOAKE entertainment’s efforts to deliver Japanese creativity to the world will broaden the possibilities of entertainment in the future. We look forward to the results of their collaboration with Soneium, as well as their challenge to create new entertainment that connects their IP, technology, and global fan community.

Sota Moriyama, CEO at YOAKE entertainment, said: Fandom has always been the beating heart of the entertainment economy. We are dedicated to exploring new forms of entertainment with technologies like blockchain and crypto, but our approach is not to disrupt the content, but to update the operating system behind it. Technology serves as the amplifier to move people’s hearts more deeply. We are accelerating this vision. We are committed to establishing Record as the universal standard on Soneium, proving that passion is the ultimate form of value.

About Record

Record is a credibly neutral infrastructure protocol that makes fandom contributions measurable, verifiable, and valuable, laying the foundation for an IPFi ecosystem powered by fandom. Currently in a private R&D phase, Record is working toward becoming a fully open-source protocol that can support all forms of IP and fandom contribution.

About YOAKE entertainment

YOAKE entertainment is a tech entertainment company founded as a joint venture by ASOBISYSTEM, TWIN PLANET, W TOKYO, and Y&N Brothers, with investment from Sony Group. The company develops IRC APP, which drives real-world adoption of Record Protocol by enabling fans to bring their passion onchain through official entertainment experiences.