Annabelle Huang is the co-founder and CEO of Altius, a blockchain infrastructure company. She is also known for her previous role as a Managing Partner at the global digital asset platform Amber Group, where she was instrumental in the firm's growth and product strategy.

Early Life

Annabelle Huang's interest in quantitative fields was influenced by her family background. Her father worked in finance, and her mother studied physics and structural engineering, which fostered her early inclination toward science, engineering, and mathematics. ^{[1] [14]}

Education

Huang attended Carnegie Mellon University, enrolling in 2011 to study mathematics and finance. Her academic background provided a foundation for her later work in both traditional and decentralized financial systems. Some professional profiles also indicate an affiliation with The London School of Economics and Political Science. ^{[1] [2]}

Career

Huang's career is marked by a distinct transition from traditional finance on Wall Street to a prominent role in the cryptocurrency and Web3 industries.

Traditional Finance

After graduating, Huang began her career at major financial institutions. She worked as an Investment Banking Analyst at Deutsche Bank in 2014 before becoming an FX Structurer at the firm from 2015 to 2017. In this role, she advised institutional clients, including private equity funds, U.S. corporations, and hedge funds, on structured solutions and risk management strategies. She later moved to Nomura, where she worked in FX and Rates Risk Advisory from 2017 to 2018. Huang has stated that she eventually felt constrained by the stringent regulations in traditional finance, which she believed limited opportunities for innovation, prompting her to explore emerging fields. ^{[2] [1]}

Transition to Cryptocurrency

In 2018, Huang transitioned into the cryptocurrency industry after being introduced to blockchain technology and Ethereum by college alumni who had founded AirSwap, an early decentralized exchange (DEX) built on the Ethereum network. She joined AirSwap as the Head of Asia, leading the platform's expansion in the region. This role immersed her in the nascent decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem, providing her with a deep understanding of its operational mechanisms, technical challenges, and limitations related to transaction efficiency and security. Her experience at AirSwap was foundational to her subsequent work in the digital asset space. ^{[1] [3]}

Amber Group

In late 2018, Huang identified a growing market need for sophisticated on-chain liquidity providers. This led her to join Amber Group, a digital asset financial services firm whose founding team shared her background in traditional finance. She served as a Managing Partner for approximately six years, officially announcing her departure in October 2024 to pursue her next venture. During her tenure, Huang played a critical role in the company's evolution from a specialized trading firm into a multi-billion dollar, comprehensive digital asset platform offering secondary market trading, venture capital, and incubation services. She led numerous "0 to 1" initiatives, spearheading the research and development of new products and expanding business lines into new regions. One of her key responsibilities was leading the GlobalX Center, a team dedicated to the firm's global expansion. After her departure, she remained affiliated with the firm as a Venture Partner. ^{[4] [5] [1]}

Rook Labs

In addition to her primary roles, Huang was a founding member of Rook Labs (formerly KeeperDAO), a DeFi protocol focused on mitigating maximal extractable value (MEV) on blockchains. Her involvement from 2020 to 2022 demonstrated her continued engagement with the core technical challenges and innovations within the DeFi ecosystem. ^[2]

Altius

In 2024, Huang co-founded Altius (also known as AltiusLabs) and serves as its CEO. The venture represents her focus on addressing fundamental infrastructure challenges to enable the mass adoption of Web3 applications.

Founding and Mission

Huang co-founded Altius with Anit Chakraborty, who serves as CTO and brings over 15 years of experience in building high-performance distributed systems at Hudson River Trading. Huang's motivation for starting Altius stemmed from her firsthand experience with the limitations of blockchain infrastructure, such as network congestion and high transaction costs, which she identified as major barriers to developing sophisticated on-chain applications.

The company's mission is to provide a high-performance, modular execution layer that can be integrated as a "plug-and-play" service for any blockchain. In an interview, Huang stated, "Altius aims to become the high-performance foundational layer for the entire industry." The goal is to empower developers of both new and existing chains to achieve high throughput and low latency without needing to build the complex underlying infrastructure themselves. ^{[6] [7]}

Technology and Approach

Altius is developing a modular execution stack designed to be independent of any single blockchain's architecture. The core technology utilizes parallel processing to increase transaction throughput by executing multiple non-conflicting transactions simultaneously. This approach is designed to scale horizontally by adding more nodes, similar to modern cloud computing services.

A key principle of Altius's strategy is to be virtual machine (VM)-agnostic while prioritizing initial compatibility with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) due to its widespread adoption. Huang has emphasized the importance of preserving the existing developer experience, stating, "Our design principle is to maintain compatibility with existing VMs. We don’t ask developers to change how they build, nor do we require them to learn new languages or paradigms." This approach is intended to lower the barrier to adoption for developers and projects seeking to enhance their performance. The technology decouples the execution layer from other blockchain functions like consensus and data availability, allowing for flexible integration with various Layer 1 and Layer 2 networks. ^{[8] [9]}

Funding

In February 2025, Altius announced it had raised an $11 million Pre-Seed funding round. The round was co-led by venture capital firms Founders Fund and Pantera Capital. Other participants included Archetype, Digital Currency Group (DCG), No Limit Holdings, and Huang's former firm, Amber Group. The funding was intended to support the development of the Altius Stack and its integration with various blockchain networks. ^{[10] [7]}

Advocacy and Mentorship

Huang is an active advocate for increasing female participation in the cryptocurrency and Web3 industries. She has served as a mentor for several organizations aimed at supporting entrepreneurs, including the Female Entrepreneurs Worldwide (FEW) Incubator, the Asia DeFi Network, and the Brinc Accelerator. In interviews, she has advised young women entering the industry to prioritize team quality, integrity, and positive motivation when evaluating opportunities at early-stage companies. ^{[11] [1]}

Public Appearances and Commentary

Huang is a frequent speaker at major industry conferences, where she discusses topics related to blockchain infrastructure, decentralized finance, and market structure. She has been listed as a speaker for events such as Consensus Hong Kong 2025 and Korea Blockchain Week 2025. She also provides public commentary on regulatory developments, such as her analysis of Singapore's Digital Token Service Providers (DTSP) regime, demonstrating her engagement with the evolving global regulatory landscape for digital assets. ^{[12] [3] [4]}

Interviews

State of Crypto #01

On March 17, 2022, in an interview on DigFin VOX by AMTD (Episode 27), Annabelle Huang, Managing Partner at Amber Group, outlined the company’s trajectory and position in the digital asset sector. She explained that Amber Group’s valuation increase, following a Series B funding round led by Temasek, was connected to market conditions and the firm’s expansion beyond proprietary trading to include retail services, decentralized finance (DeFi), and Web3 activities.

Huang compared developments in the crypto industry to structures in traditional finance, noting that greater regulatory clarity and technologies such as tokenization could influence how the two systems interact. She also remarked on the uneven regulatory landscape worldwide and referred to Singapore’s approach as supportive of Amber Group’s operations after shifting part of its base from Hong Kong.

The discussion covered several wider industry topics. Huang stated that central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) and cryptocurrencies serve distinct roles and are expected to coexist. She described the firm’s retail platform WhaleFin, which seeks to simplify user engagement through education and accessible features. On non-fungible tokens (NFTs), she observed that market volatility had affected perceptions but suggested that NFTs hold continuing relevance for digital ownership and possible applications in areas such as carbon credits. She further commented on the use of stablecoins, emphasizing their role in regions where U.S. dollar access is constrained.

Huang also addressed Amber Group’s consideration of a potential initial public offering (IPO), indicating an interest in traditional fundraising methods while leaving open the possibility of digital alternatives. She concluded by noting the company’s focus on areas such as DeFi, NFTs, and blockchain-based gaming within the broader digital economy. ^[15]

Tales of Web3 Podcast #02

On May 16, 2025, Annabelle Huang participated in the Tales of Web3 podcast, hosted by Altius Labs. In the interview, she outlined her professional background and shared her perspective on developments in the blockchain sector.

Huang discussed her early career in traditional finance, where she worked with FX options and derivatives. She noted that this experience provided skills that were later applied in the cryptocurrency industry. She also described her initial exposure to Bitcoin and Ethereum, followed by her involvement with AirSwap and her six years at Amber. At Amber, she was involved in building business lines and client-facing products, which she identified as formative for her later work at Altius.

Regarding Altius, Huang presented the company as a blockchain-agnostic execution engine intended to improve trading performance on-chain. She explained the aim of creating a shared execution layer capable of operating across multiple blockchain virtual machines, including EVM, Solana, Cosmos, and Move.

The conversation also addressed broader industry themes. Huang commented on fundraising, market fluctuations, and the importance of maintaining trust and a long-term approach. She remarked on the challenges of communicating blockchain concepts to institutional investors and noted that existing narratives, such as those around Ethereum’s decentralization, may not always align with institutional priorities.

Additional points included her views on token distribution, where she referred to balancing investor participation with broader accessibility. She also mentioned the influence of professional and personal networks in shaping her career path. The interview concluded with an outline of Altius’s ongoing development and community engagement plans. ^[16]