Ritual and EigenLayer Forge Partnership to Drive Development of AI-Enabled Decentralized Applications

Crypto News– EigenLayer, renowned as the leading restaking protocol on Ethereum in terms of total value locked (TVL), has forged a partnership with Ritual, a community-owned artificial intelligence (AI) network, to collaboratively develop AI-driven decentralized applications (DApps).

Ritual and EigenLayer Forge Partnership to Drive Development of AI-Enabled Decentralized Applications

This strategic alliance aims to integrate Ethereum-level restaking security into the Ritual network and leverage AI capabilities within DApps. These AI functionalities include smart agents, AI-based decentralized finance (DeFi) applications, and autonomous media generation, as outlined in a press release shared with Cointelegraph.

According to EigenLayer’s founder, Sreeram Kannan, the incorporation of crypto-economic, AI-powered coprocessors can unlock significant new features for blockchain networks while incentivizing economic participation. Kannan stated:

“Ritual is pioneering the development of the first crypto-economic AI coprocessor to usher in a new era of AI-enabled smart DApps. We’re thrilled to collaborate with this innovative team to introduce Ethereum staking security to this emerging domain, empowering EigenLayer stakers and operators to contribute to a more decentralized and transparent AI ecosystem.”

This partnership arrives amidst growing interest in AI-driven solutions within the crypto sphere, notably highlighted by a February 18 post by Vitalik Buterin on X, where the Ethereum co-founder expressed enthusiasm for AI-powered smart contract auditing to address code vulnerabilities. Buterin underscored bugs as the “biggest technical risk” to the Ethereum network. In line with this, Ritual’s inaugural product, Infernet, is poised to become the first platform facilitating smart contracts’ access to AI models cost-effectively and seamlessly. This integration will foster the development of novel Actively Validated Services (AVS) to fortify Ritual’s infrastructure, enabling EigenLayer restakers equipped with GPU capabilities to support decentralized inference, fine-tuning, and verification within its on-chain ecosystem.