First Block deploys next-generation digital securities architecture for real-world operating business

First Block, Inc., a digital securities and tokenisation infrastructure company, together with Onpharma Company (Delaware) and UK-based Crito Capital LLP, today announce the launch of what is believed to be the first Solana-based Security Token Offering (“STO”) for an established U.S. operating business. This offering deploys blockchain-powered securities infrastructure for international capital formation and marks a structural turning point in the modernisation of global private markets.

The offering concerns Onpharma Company, developer of the Onset EZ Pen dental anaesthetic buffering system. Onpharma’s ongoing commercial operations, clearly identifiable market opportunity, and proven real-world application make it a natural inaugural issuer for an innovative transaction of this importance.  

THE TOKENISATION FRAMEWORK 

The STO deploys the Solana ecosystem creating capital markets infrastructure that combines blockchain settlement technology, programmable ownership architecture, and digital distribution capabilities. This securities transaction is structured within existing U.S. securities law, and uses blockchain infrastructure to do what traditional private markets have never been able to do efficiently: issue, settle, and distribute a private offering to qualified investors across borders quickly, transparently, and at low cost. 

Built on Solana, the framework is designed to support atomic settlement, meaning that any secondary transaction would occur on-chain, while accommodating trading across a multiplicity of compatible wallets subject to applicable KYC controls.  

For investors, this means near-instantaneous settlement replacing multi-day, multi-intermediary, manual processes, and secondary trading functionality that introduces liquidity where private markets have historically struggled, as well as international accessibility structured under Regulation S and other applicable frameworks. 

THE STO STRUCTURE 

A Security Token Offering is a securities issuance in which ownership rights in the Company’s common stock are represented and transferred via blockchain-based digital tokens rather than through traditional paper or electronic share registers.  

The Onpharma STO is structured as a Regulation S offering, the U.S. securities framework governing offshore issuances to non-U.S. investors. The structure is designed to combine the legal certainty of an exempt securities offering with the operational efficiency of Solana-based blockchain infrastructure, giving eligible investors an instrument within an automated and rigorous framework, settled and distributed at a speed and cost that traditional private markets cannot match. 

ONPHARMA: THE INVESTMENT CASE 

Onpharma Company occupies a distinctive position in the global dental technology market. Its flagship Onset EZ local anaesthetic buffering product has already achieved significant commercial scale, being used to buffer millions of dental anaesthetic injections annually. Onpharma buffering technology addresses problems that have remained largely unsolved in decades: the slow, uncomfortable, and unreliable performance of local anaesthetic in dentistry.  The Onset EZ Pen eliminates the need for assembly or specialised training, integrating a simple effective buffering device directly into existing workflows and delivering an improved patient experience. 

Onpharma is attractive now because it sits at a post-validation, pre-scale inflection point: the heavy lifting has already been completed for infrastructure and supply chain build-out, regulatory compliance, initial commercialisation, while the growth phase is only beginning. Septodont’s February 2025 entry has validated dental anaesthetic buffering as an emerging standard of care, reducing category risk and increasing market awareness, while the disposable Onset EZ Pen gives Onpharma operational leverage as additional revenue can be pursued through scalable direct marketing, customer conversion and repeat consumable purchases. 

The global dental anaesthesia buffering market is valued at $2bn and is projected to reach around $2.65bn by 2030. The company’s capital requirements reflect the next stage of that commercial expansion, to extend field sales operations and expand direct selling through the Company’s recently deployed AI marketing tools.  

THE INFRASTRUCTURE BEHIND THE OFFERING 

First Block’s digital securities architecture underpins this transaction, from issuance and compliance to Solana-based settlement and distribution. Where conventional private placements rely on fragmented custodial arrangements, manual processing, and multi-intermediary chains that add cost, limit participation, and add delay at every stage, the tokenised framework deployed here compresses that infrastructure into a single, programmable, blockchain-enabled system. The result is a capital markets stack built for the scale, speed and wallet-level accessibility that international investors increasingly require. 

The transaction is being structured in collaboration with Crito Capital LLP, an FCA-authorised investment banking and advisory platform focused on institutional capital formation and international financial markets, which is providing structuring, and advisory for the offering. 

“This is larger than a traditional financing,” said Daniel P. Cannon, CEO of First Block. “We believe this transaction represents the beginning of the convergence between capital markets and Solana-based securities infrastructure. The STO itself is the story, but it starts with a real operating company, a real product, and exceptional revenue growth potential.” 

“Onpharma has spent years building a real operating business around a simple clinical objective: making local anaesthetic better for dentists and patients,” said Matt Stepovich, Onpharma’s CEO. “This offering allows us to present a validated, revenue-generating medical device platform to a wider base of qualified international investors via a structure that reflects how capital markets are evolving. Combining Onpharma’s real-world commercial traction with First Block’s Solana-based securities infrastructure is an important step in making growth capital formation more efficient, accessible and transparent.” 

Additional details regarding offering structure and participation frameworks are available on the landing page for the STO offering linked here – sto.onpharma.com