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Introducing KYVE

Introducing KYVE

Fabian Riewe

Fabian Riewe

@RieweFabian

You wouldn’t build your house on shaky ground. Why build your project on shaky data?

KYVE Networkis revolutionizing customized access to on- and off-chain data by providing fast and easy tooling for decentralized data validation, immutability, and retrieval. With these tools, developers, validators, data engineers, and others can easily and reliably access the trustless data they need to continue building the future of Web3.

With KYVE, we aim to make data a public good for a trustless future. Anyone working with data shouldn’t have to worry about the data’s integrity or the roadblocks they might face when trying to get to it.

TL;DR

  • Discover KYVE’s official blog platformhere for the latest project updates and announcements. After three years, KYVE stopped using Medium to post in Q2 2024.

  • KYVE Mainnet/TGE launched on March 14th, 2023, and has two testnet networks: Kaon and Korellia. On Korellia, KYVE has over 20 data pool integrations with fellow partners, along with 43k+ active users (during incentivized testnet).

  • The KYVE Network Stack includes KYVE, the data validation and transfer protocol, the Data Lake to keep track of the trustless data, Data Pipeline for no-code data sourcing and transformation, and KYSNC for fast node-network syncing.

  • KYVE is backed by top VCs, including Hypersphere Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Distributed Global, Mechanism Capital, CMS Holdings, IOSG Ventures, and blockchains such as Cosmos, Arweave, Avalanche, Solana, Interchain, and NEAR. In total, KYVE has raised ~$13M during its three funding rounds.

Today’s Web3 Data Roadblocks

There are two major issues in today’s data space that create roadblocks and hazards for developers, node runners, data engineers, and Web3 scalability as a whole. Those issues being: 1. easy and reliable data access, and 2. data validity. Let’s explain…

The growth of Web3 has resulted in the creation of vast amounts of data, which makes accessing specific data increasingly difficult, particularly when the pieces are interdependent. Additionally, maintaining a complete copy of a blockchain, for example, what is required for archival nodes, is not incentivized and is not attractive due to growing data storage costs. This has resulted in nodes relying more on more centralized solutions, such as the Solana Foundation, which introduces the risk of single point of failure or data validity and reliability. Other solutions can also be quite costly.

On top of this, the time it takes to search through all of the data can also be a significant roadblock in development or node participation, sometimes requiring weeks to get a piece of historical data needed. Then, after all of this effort in accessing and retrieving a certain piece of data needed, you might not even be 100% sure that it’s fully correct or up to date. This brings us to issue number two: data validity.

For example, when projects source off-chain data, oracles are their go-to tool as they provide an easy access point to deterministic Web2 data. However, no matter if an oracle claims that they verify the data or not, there is an underlying issue that remains: Lack of trustlessness. Suppose a project automatically implements incorrect data provided by an oracle without double-checking. In that case, it can become highly vulnerable to attacks, losses, improper pricing, and/or data process discrepancies as it opens itself up to an attack vector from one source.

So, how can we weed through all the data and check if it’s accurate in a trustless way? Bring in true decentralization. Decentralization is the key pillar of Web3, distributing power, trust, and actions among stakeholders and network participants. However, to determine if a piece of data is valid, developers need to create custom validation methods per data set, and managing these different runtimes and ensuring all data sets are appropriately sourced and validated can be challenging.

To ease the overall experience in accessing and working with data, a decentralized data-sourcing solution with built-in validation and access tooling is required, much like KYVE!

KYVE’s Solution

At the core of KYVE Network lies its innovative decentralized data validation and transfer protocol, a powerhouse driving the network’s efficiency and reliability. This protocol is a cornerstone in ensuring decentralized data validation, immutability, and seamless retrieval.

KYVE is its own Layer 1 blockchain and sits in between any data source and data availability or storage layers, such as Arweave or Celestia, guaranteeing an enhanced and customizable experience from start to finish.

The KYVE BlockchainKYVE is its own DPoS Layer 1 blockchain with two distinct layers: the Consensus Layer, and the Protocol Layer, each with its own validator infrastructure.

  • The consensus layer is the backbone of KYVE and is an entirely sovereign Delegated Proof of Stake (DPoS) blockchain built with the Cosmos SDK and CometBFT. It’s run by independent validators, which enable users to support and secure the KYVE blockchain with $KYVE, the official blockchain coin.

  • Sitting on top of the consensus layer is the Protocol Layer, which enables the actual use case of KYVE’s data lake. This includes data pools, funding, and delegation. The protocol layer has its own protocol validators, which are responsible for collecting data from a data source, bundling and uploading it to the chosen decentralized storage solution, and then validating it, keeping track of which data is truly valid for its users to tap into. This enables KYVE to store any data permanently and in a decentralized manner, creating a Web3 data lake.

The KYVE Network Stack:

  • KYVE: The data validation and transfer protocol;

  • Data Lake: The trustless hub for tracking KYVE’s validated data, accessible via REST-API;

  • Data Pipeline: For data sourcing and transformation in just a few clicks, enabling easy import of KYVE data into your preferred data warehouse, such as BigQuery, Postgres, or other databases;

  • KSYNC: Data syncing tool enabling your node to rapidly sync with blocks, snapshots, and historical data of any blockchain.

KYVE TodayAfter two years of intense development, KYVE mainnet officially went live at 14:03:14 UTC on March 14th, enabling the consensus layer and a strong network to open the doors for easy access to truly trustless data via KYVE. With this, developers, data engineers, node runners, and more are that much closer to an easy, reliable solution for sourcing trustless data.

KYVE’s Journey to Mainnet

From a small bounty project bridging Polkadot data to Arweave, to an EVM-Based smart contract, then officially launching as its own Layer 1 Cosmos-based chain, KYVE went from being a simple solution to an entire network built toward changing the data world for the better.

Along its journey toward mainnet launch, KYVE hit many key milestones, expanding its reach and capabilities along the way…

From Korellia to Kaon to KYVEKYVE’s first testnet, Korellia, was used for an incentivized testnet in order to best put KYVE’s features and functionalities to the test. This incentivized testnet was a huge success, with over 43,000 active users funding, and delegating in pools, and/or participating in KYVE’s governance.

From this, we were able to collect a plethora of community learnings and suggestions on how to enhance KYVE, releasing multiple upgrades and, eventually, a testnet v2 dubbed Kaon. Kaon is our “mainnet testnet,” meaning it’s our official staging environment before taking new features and data pools to the KYVE mainnet.

“It’s been very exciting seeing all the pieces come together.” Said KYVE’s Co-Founder and CTO, John Letey. “With Kaon replicating mainnet as much as possible, its launch has given us a preview and great insight as to how KYVE’s mainnet launch will go. In the long run, it will be the perfect staging environment, stemming from all our learnings from Korellia.”

On March 14th, KYVE mainnet went live, enabling the consensus layer and a strong network to open the doors to easy access to truly trustless data via KYVE. Currently, there are 100 chain validators running smoothly on the chain.

Ecosystem: Partnering with the Top L1sAt its start, KYVE was already partnered with Polkadot and Arweave and quickly gained support from NEAR, Cosmos, Avalanche, and Solana.

As our testnet grew throughout 2021 and 2022, we brought on ten new partnerships and collaborations with projects such as Injective, Evmos, Axelar, Umee, Sei Network, Archway, and more. You can find these testnet data pool integrations on the Korellia web app. We look forward to bringing these solutions onto mainnet!

“We’re thrilled to see KYVE officially launch mainnet, bringing forward yet another innovative solution, built on Cosmos SDK, for enhancing today’s developer experience. With KYVE, free and easy access to trustless data is now possible.” Chris Zhong, Technical Director, Interchain Foundation.

Raising $13M Throughout these two years, KYVE held three funding rounds, providing a total of ~$13M raised. The first round was led by Permanent Ventures and comprised notable investors, including Hypersphere Ventures, 4SV, Compute Ventures, Arweave, Avalanche Foundation, Interchain Foundation, NEAR Foundation, and others.

The second round was led by Permanent Ventures and Hypersphere Ventures, as well as outstanding crypto funds and networks such as Volt Capital, Mechanism Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Distributed Global, 4SV, Compute Ventures, Zee Prime, CMS Holding, Ternary Capital, Mina Foundation, and more. Finally, the third round totaled $9M, led by key players such as Distributed Global, Wicklow Capital, IOSG Ventures, Anagram, Cerulean Ventures, Huobi Incubator, and MEXC.

“We’re constantly impressed by the KYVE team’s ability to ship products and engage their community with a developer-centric approach to data availability. We see their web3 infrastructure as critical to climate data use cases, both web2 and web3, in this decade. What we’ve seen recently is that fighting climate change is as much a coordination problem as it is a technological problem, and providing trustless and easy access to climate data will go a long way toward addressing these core coordination issues.” Jahed Momand, General Partner at Cerulean Ventures.

Introducing The KYVE FoundationShortly after mainnet launch, the KYVE Foundation was officially established. The KYVE Foundation was brought in to further support the growth of KYVE Network’s technology and trustless ecosystem. Promoting the full and gradual decentralization of KYVE Network and its technology, further empowering today’s builders with the necessary resources and trustless data to bring forward the innovative platforms and applications of tomorrow.