Scaling with ZK Coprocessors

Key Insights

• Verifiable compute, a key feature of ZK technology, can enable more advanced smart contract apps by offloading compute-intensive logic offchain without introducing any new trust assumptions.
• Developers have grappled with integrating ZK technology into their apps, primarily due to its complexity and high barriers to entry, which have impeded widespread adoption.
• ZK coprocessors provide developers with cost-effective and trustless offchain computing capabilities, while eliminating the need for developers to engage with ZK-related components in their tech stack.

Today, smart contract developers are unable to build more sophisticated applications due to the prohibitive cost and limitations of onchain computing, which stifles more complex application logic. While offchain computing alternatives exist, they often introduce new trust assumptions and are inefficient, requiring multiple nodes to redundantly execute a computation.

Fortunately, zero-knowledge technology offers a solution. Zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) make it possible for one party to prove to another party the correct execution of a program offchain, all without the need to repeat the original computation or disclose the input data. While zero-knowledge (ZK) technology holds potential for both verifiable computation and privacy solutions, the predominant focus of current development efforts are centered around verifiable compute.

In an environment where applications are increasing in sophistication and blockspace is growing scarcer, the ability to offload complex logic offchain without bringing in new trust assumptions, can significantly expand the smart contract design space. For instance, smart contracts could be given the ability to inference (query) machine learning models.