At 18, Harshal Madnani from Kolkata has taken a unique path while many teenagers are focused on other things. As the founder and CEO of Xade Finance, a company in the decentralised finance (DeFi) sector, Madnani is committed to making DeFi accessible. His platform offers services for payments, savings, borrowing, and investing, and he aims to make blockchain technology so user-friendly that even his grandmother could use it.
Madnani also recently shared his excitement about attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, where he will be part of DavosWeb3. He announced on LinkedIn, “Excited to announce that I’ll be at WEF Davos 25 and be a founding member of DavosWeb3, co-authoring the Inclusion Whitepaper and signing the Davos Declaration.”
His journey into the world of crypto and blockchain started early—at just 13, Madnani began building arbitrage bots for trading across centralised exchanges, decentralised exchanges (DEXs), and derivatives platforms. This hands-on experience helped him develop a deep understanding of blockchain technology and its financial potential.
In January 2022, Madnani co-founded Xade Finance with the goal of solving issues like liquidity fragmentation and complex user interfaces in the DeFi space. The company quickly gained traction, attracting 10,000 users and reaching $1 million in transaction volume. This success led to the company catching the attention of Web3 advisor Ajeet Khurana, who became Xade Finance’s first investor. With his backing, the company’s valuation surged to $10 million, fueling its growth.
By 2024, Xade Finance had achieved a cumulative trading volume of $20 million and made a major move by merging with EdgeIn, a US-based Web3 data company. The merger created EdgeIn-Xade, combining blockchain data expertise and DeFi solutions, resulting in $200,000 in annual recurring revenue (ARR) and securing $1.4 million in funding.
