Author: Revc
Preface
As a bellwether in the crypto space, a16z Accelerator has been leading the industry's innovation. This fall, a16z selected 21 of the most innovative projects from a number of startups around the world, covering a variety of fields such as artificial intelligence and decentralized finance. This article will analyze representative projects and reveal the future development trend of the crypto market.
Project Overview
Anera Labs — Building a liquidity infrastructure that unifies all on-chain liquidity
Anera Labs is a liquidity infrastructure built for user intent, introducing a new concept in decentralized systems. Instead of specifying specific actions, users express their desired results through signature conditions. This allows specialized solvers to determine the most efficient way to achieve intent, separating "what" from "how".
Anera Labs uses two auction mechanisms to activate liquidity: First Come First Served (FCFS) and Request for Quote (RFQ). FCFS prioritizes speed and will accept the first qualified bid regardless of price. RFQ, on the other hand, allows competition between fillers and may result in better prices, but takes more time.
Fillers play a vital role in these protocols, acting as intermediaries between users and the network. Their competition drives better execution quality and lower user fees. However, the potential for censorship by protocols and fillers remains a concern in decentralized systems. Protocol censorship occurs when off-chain components are involved in the execution process, introducing centralization and potentially compromising the fairness of the system. Filler censorship occurs when fillers selectively refuse to service certain orders, limiting users’ choices and potentially leaving them with financial difficulties.
Blocksense — Supports the creation of oracles that can utilize Internet data and CPU/GPU computing
BlockSense is an oracle network designed to overcome the limitations of traditional data feeds on the blockchain. By leveraging zero-knowledge proofs and a decentralized network of nodes, it improves the efficiency, security, and transparency of oracles.
BlockSense's Merkle tree-based extensions enable cost-effective data publishing and access. Flexible fees and potential chain subsidies promote the development of the DeFi ecosystem. At the same time, anyone can create data feeds, become a data provider, and access the entire world of data. Encryption mechanisms also ensure data integrity and minimize trust requirements. Guaranteed data availability and prevent censorship.
Cork Protocol — Accelerating the risk pricing protocol of on-chain credit
Cork is a protocol designed to simplify the creation and trading of pegged asset collateral swaps. Similar to credit default swaps, Cork's depegged swaps allow users to hedge against volatility in various markets in DeFi.
Cork users deposit Redeemable Assets (RA) into the Cork Pegged Stability Module (PSM). The PSM creates Depeg Swaps (DS) and Collateral Tokens (CT) for a specific Pegged Asset (PA). DS holders can redeem their PA for RA during a depeg event. DS and CT are traded on the AMM, setting prices and yields for buyers and underwriters. Meanwhile, the Liquidity Vault provides passive income to liquidity providers.
Cork’s PSM ensures that users can redeem their original principal even in the event of a decoupling. And provides cheaper pricing and rewards for liquidity providers. Users can buy, sell and hedge their positions freely. Cork provides a solution for managing risks and maximizing returns in the DeFi ecosystem.
Kuzco——LLM Reasoning Market
Kuzco is a decentralized GPU cluster based on the Solana blockchain. It aims to provide efficient and economical inference services for large language models (such as Llama3, Mistral, Phi3) by utilizing idle GPU resources contributed by network participants. Users can easily access these models through an API compatible with OpenAI. Kuzco's distributed architecture enables it to fully utilize the computing power of the network to achieve reasoning of large-scale models. At the same time, users are encouraged to contribute idle resources through a reward mechanism.
OpenGradient — Building a blockchain that brings the world’s computation to the blockchain
OpenGradient is building an EVM-compatible blockchain network designed to be a scalable and secure execution layer for AI.
Since OpenGradient Network provides access to inference AI models directly through pre-compilation in smart contracts, it is able to maximize the composability of smart contracts. Simply stringing inference calls to different models in smart contracts allows you to create powerful use cases.
As for interoperability, since OpenGradient is an EVM-compatible network, smart contracts on OpenGradient are able to interact with contracts on other chains through cross-chain queries and cross-chain calls facilitated by major cross-chain solutions. The OpenGradient team is also planning an ERC to build a future architecture for how on-chain agents and models interact with each other on EVM-compatible networks.
PIN AI - Building an open platform for personal AI (data + agents)
The PIN AI platform aims to revolutionize the field of personal AI by combining cryptoeconomic security with privacy, ownership, and a variety of applications. Unlike existing AI solutions, which are often limited by data access and privacy issues, PIN AI uses blockchain technology to create a secure and open network for AI services.
The PIN Protocol consists of three key components: a data connector and on-chain registry, a private storage and compute layer, and an agent link and intent marketplace. These components work together to ensure privacy, data ownership, and efficient matching of user intent with AI agents. PIN AI’s architecture is designed to balance privacy, performance, and personalization through its hybrid model and personal index. By combining on-device processing with cloud-based computing and leveraging a structured knowledge graph, PIN AI provides contextually relevant, personalized responses while maintaining user privacy.
The PIN economy is driven by a two-sided marketplace where users and their personal AIs can access services from external AIs. Data connectors and proxy services play a vital role in facilitating this exchange and are incentivized through the PoE (proof-of-engagement protocol).
Term Labs — DeFi lending platform that matches borrowers and lenders at fixed rates
Term Finance Protocol is a transparent and scalable non-custodial fixed-rate liquidity protocol for digital assets.
Supports on-chain non-custodial fixed-rate mortgages (Term Repos), whose model is similar to the tri-party repo arrangements commonly seen in TradFi.
Borrowers and lenders are matched through a unique periodic auction process (Term Auctions), where borrowers submit sealed bids and lenders submit sealed offers, which are used to determine the interest rate that clears the market for the participants of that auction. Participants who bid above the clearing rate will receive a loan, and participants willing to lend below the clearing rate will provide a loan, in each case at the market clearing rate. All other participants' bids and offers are referred to as "pending".
At the end of the auction, the borrower receives the loan proceeds and the lender receives ERC-20 tokens (Term Repo tokens), which the lender will redeem for principal and interest at maturity. The protocol smart contract services these transactions by recording repayments and monitoring collateral health and liquidations.
Term supports the deployment of periodic repo. Periodic repo is a specific on-chain implementation of fixed-rate mortgage loans modeled after tri-party repo in the TradFi environment. The main features of periodic repo include:
Fixed term, fixed rate: Regular repo involves fixed term, fixed rate loans, rather than open floating rate loans common in DeFi. The borrower must repay the loan on the maturity date or repurchase date, and must repay within the repurchase window.
Irredeemable: Term repurchase agreements are irredeemable, meaning the lender cannot redeem them before maturity or the repurchase date, and the borrower cannot repay them.
Collateralization: Regular repurchases are designed to meet short-term liquidity management needs and are conducted in an over-collateralized manner backed by liquid digital assets (e.g. wBTC, wETH, USDC, USDT).
Non-custodial: The collateral for the repo is not held in custody, but is locked in a decentralized smart contract that can be verified in real time by both borrowers and lenders. At the same time, collateral re-hypothecation is not allowed and can only be accessed by users using their private keys and strictly abiding by the terms of the smart contract arrangement. Each repo has a separate repo "locker" associated with it.
Auction mechanism: The interest rate of a term repo is determined by an auction mechanism, the so-called "term auction". Each term repo has its own "term auction".
summary
Through the a16z accelerator project, we can clearly see two major trends, namely infrastructure innovation and the deep integration of AI and blockchain. The crypto industry is expanding from simple digital currency transactions to a wider range of application areas. With the continuous advancement of technology and the improvement of supervision, cryptocurrency will gradually integrate into our daily lives and bring more innovation and change to society.
