Dissecting the Intersection of AI and Crypto

Key Takeaways

• The AI x Crypto sector, or decentralized AI, continues to see an explosion of growth, with many projects surpassing billion dollar valuations, and hundreds of millions of dollars flowing in to fund teams building in this space.
• The massive economies of scale associated with centralized, closed-source AI companies has, to date, largely kept them as the pack leaders in AI development, with open-source playing catch up.
• To deliver viable alternatives that compete with centralized, closed-source solutions, decentralized AI teams will need to innovate on model architectures and leverage model coordination platforms. In practice, this will enable ML researchers and engineers to broadly experiment with a wide variety of models aimed at different application verticals. This largely reflects how crypto networks can accelerate AI development.
• Simultaneously, onchain applications and protocols will likely find a new class of onchain participants via AI agents. Numerous teams, like Wayfinder and Autonolas, are building protocols in this domain. These developments reflect how AI can accelerate the growth and economic activity of onchain applications and protocols.
• Looking ahead, this space shows no signs of stagnation, and it's expected that both of these technologies continue to propel each other forward.

Introduction