March 13, 2024

UNCHAINED: Why EigenLayer May Be the Most Innovative New Ecosystem Since Ethereum

1 hour 16 minutes

Developer activity on EigenLayer has sprouted up extremely quickly, according to founder Sreeram Kannan and investor Olaf Carlson-Wee.

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Sreeram Kannan, founder of EigenLayer, and Olaf Carlson-Wee, founder and CIO of Polychain Capital, an investor in EigenLayer, say that the developer ecosystem around EigenLayer is sprouting up very fast, which reminds Carlson-Wee of the developer excitement in Ethereum’s early days.

They discuss the potential of EigenLayer, which uses a restaking mechanism to allow ETH stakers to reallocate their staked ETH and Liquid Staking Tokens (LSTs) to bolster security for other protocols. They cover how it could turbocharge Ethereum's rollup scaling roadmap and enable Ethereum to become a stack of decentralized software-as-a-service providers. Additionally, they discuss the potential risks associated with restaking as well as how EigenLayer could work with AI.

Show highlights:

Sreeram's explanation of what EigenLayer is and what is allows on Ethereum

Why Polychain invested in EigenLayer's seed round

Why Sreerarm believes that there are not just going to be three modules in blockchains, but thousands

The types of applications that can be built with actively validated services, according to Sreeram

Why they both believe that EigenLayer will improve smart contracts

Whether EigenLayer will help solve the liquidity fragmentation issue in Layer 2s

What Ethereum inclusion guarantees are and why they are important

The potential risks of EigenLayer and why Olaf doesn’t agree that EigenLayer results in rehypothecation

How attribution claims work in EigenLayer, allowing for "elastic scaling of security"

EigenLayer’s points program and the likelihood of a token

Why Sreeram believes that an EigenLayer governance token wouldn't have the same issues as Lido's LDO

Whether EigenLayer should be a core part of the Ethereum protocol itself

How AI and EigenLayer intersect and how to have permissionless innovation in the AI space

Thank you to our sponsors! Polkadot

Guest |

Olaf Carlson-Wee, founder and CIO of Polychain Capital

Previous appearances on Unchained:

OG Olaf Carlson-Wee on Why His Crypto Thesis Is Stronger Than Ever

Olaf Carlson-Wee: 'If There Is a Money-Losing Exploit, the Money Is Gone'

Why The First Employee Of Coinbase Launched A Hedge Fund

To the Moon and Back With Polychain's Olaf Carlson-Wee

Special Episode with CNBC's Crypto Trader: Olaf Carlson-Wee on Why This Crypto Winter Is Different From Previous Ones

All Things Cryptoeconomics, Pt. 1, With Olaf Carlson-Wee and Ryan Zurrer of Polychain Capital

Sreeram Kannan, founder of EigenLayer

Previous appearance on Unchained: Do You Need to Think Twice Before Restaking Your Assets?

Links |

EigenLayer

Unchained:

What Is Ethereum Restaking? A Beginner's Guide

ETHDenver’s 2024 Hackathon: Onchain Security, AI, and Gaming Fun Dominate the Winning Projects

A16z, Binance Labs Make Investments in EigenLayer Ecosystem

EigenDA Overview

Sreeram’s post on why “building on EigenLayer, therefore, doesn't negate the utility of an AVS token”

Points

DL News: Kelp DAO opens trading of the $340m EigenLayer airdrop market with KEP

CoinDesk: Omni Network Signs $600M Restaking Deal With Ether.Fi to Enhance Security

Unchained Podcast is Produced by Laura Shin Media, LLC. Distributed by CoinDesk. Senior Producer is Michele Musso and Executive Producer is Jared Schwartz.

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