Cross-Chain Universal App Layer to Boost EVM Efficiency by 90% - Skate CEO

Each of these industry leaders brings a wealth of technical knowledge and experience in blockchain infrastructure, smart contract development and scalability solutions. With Polygon and Lido, developers in each scalable ecosystem can benefit from Skate as a solution to embed cross-chain interoperability at the application layer from the get-go and eliminate the costly expense of spending for liquidity bootstraps. This approach allows for more users to proliferate across different ecosystems. With Skate's pre-confirmation layer secured as an EigenLayer actively validated service (AVS), it can help dApps with proper trust-minimized assumptions and enable innovative use cases in the realm of restaking. Pendle also plays a crucial role in managing LRT tokens, which are essential to the organization and effective implementation of the Eigenlayer, further strengthening Skate's utility for decentralized finance applications.

Through strategic partnerships with these prominent Web3 projects, we naturally benefit from their network effects — gaining access to networks, communities and resources — to drive adoption of Skate and demonstrate credibility within the DeFi community.

Rather than attempting to override existing systems, prioritizing interoperability ensures that Skate can coexist harmoniously within established ecosystems. The concept of coopetition (competitive cooperation), is inherently interwoven into the fabric of blockchain. By facilitating seamless interaction between connected chains in real-time through intent-centric execution and leveraging EigenLayer for rapid finality, Skate enhances rather than disrupts existing infrastructure. 

Skate is simply making it easier for multi-chain deployment. The broader Web3 ecosystem is united in its goal to create an interconnected network of tokenized economies. This doesn't change the fundamental complexity of application development in different virtual machine (VM) environments — that in itself requires significant resources and tools like software development kits, operating systems and the like. The key lies in reducing the resource burden for dApp and blockchain developers so they can focus on building expressivity, instead of focusing efforts on backward compatibility, to benefit all players in the Web3 value chain.

When applications trust Skate, they can operate on all chains with one single state — allowing them to interact with users on 1000s of chains. Also known as the Universal Application Layer, it ensures that the application logic is maintained as a unified state on Skate, while assets remain on their native chains. This ensures foundational needs of builders and users are met efficiently, allowing each chain to focus on creating value-added services and laying the building blocks for a modular future. 

As with any form of interoperability, there are risks involved when it comes to cross-chain activity. We are designing the protocol such that certain whitelisted players take on interoperability risks to provide faster finalities, which significantly reduces  attack vectors. Aside from that, our vision is to make EVM applications run across EVM and non-EVM chains with one global state, like a liquidity pool operating on Ethereum and Solana with one state. This may present novel smart contract risks to have a common intent standard in between them. We will be undergoing extensive audits prior to and following our mainnet launch.

Skate is currently at its testnet phase and has two major components, a customized Optimism Bedrock hub chain and Oracle-based state oracle running as an AVS. Any application leveraging Skate will have its state and app logic live on Skate. For users interacting, they can sign intents across any of the supported chains and get the efficiency of the global application state across all the chains. Mainnet is due to be live by the end of Q2 2024. When Skate's Universal Application Layer eventually goes live on EigenLayer mainnet, we expect it to enhance functionality and efficiency as application executions happen in real time with faster finalities, enabling connected full-stack applications like AMMs, lending markets, NFT marketplaces and more.

Skate faces several practical challenges when integrating with different blockchain infrastructures. Foremost, establishing a common standard, such as a unified messaging protocol between different ecosystems like Solana and Ethereum, is critical. This requires aligning different technical specifications and governance models, which can be complex due to the distinct architectures of each blockchain.

Secondly, achieving faster finalities while managing blockchain reorganizations (reorgs) presents a significant challenge. Reorgs require a robust mechanism to ensure that transactions remain valid and consistent across chains. Skate is actively developing its strategies to handle reorgs effectively, striving to enhance the security and reliability of cross-chain interactions.

A potential scenario could be when dApps require deep integration into a specific blockchain that might not be easily adaptable by Skate. If a dApp relies heavily on a particular blockchain's consensus mechanisms or native tokenomics, Skate's generalized approach might not fully accommodate the intricacies required by such dApps. In such cases, it would make more sense to build and deploy the dApp directly rather than use Skate as an intermediary layer.

Skate addresses the inherent security challenges of interoperability through a multi-layered approach:

• EigenLayer AVS: Skate utilizes EigenLayer to enhance security and ensure that applications operate correctly across different chains. This layer acts as a pre-confirmation mechanism, providing faster finalities with high trust assumptions.
• Whitelisted Intermediaries: To mitigate risks in cross-chain transactions, Skate employs whitelisted intermediaries that are responsible for managing pre-confirmation interoperability functionalities. These intermediaries are rigorously vetted and required to meet high security standards to minimize potential vulnerabilities.
• Comprehensive Auditing: Continuous auditing processes are implemented, involving extensive security audits and code reviews from both internal teams and external security firms. This helps identify and address potential vulnerabilities in Skate's protocol and maintains the integrity of its cross-chain transactions.

While striving for high interoperability, Skate does face inherent trade-offs:

• Speed vs. Security: The need for rapid finalities across chains may sometimes conflict with the thoroughness required for optimal security. To address this, Skate utilizes whitelisted intermediaries to provide faster finalities, while pulling out all the stops to implement robust security protocols.
• Global State Risks: Maintaining a global state across both EVM and non-EVM chains introduces novel smart contract risks. Common intent standards between these different environments must be carefully managed to prevent vulnerabilities.

Given that Skate allows developers to operate across 1000s of chains, this grants developers access to an unlimited Web3 user base. They can leverage Skate to tap into the liquidity and user base of major chains, enhancing the strategic potential of their applications.

The current multi-chain ecosystem is plagued by fragmentation, with applications and users scattered across different blockchain networks. Skate's unified approach to application development can help reduce fragmentation by consolidating development efforts and fostering a more cohesive ecosystem, ultimately leading to stronger economies of scale for developers.

We aim to redefine the blockchain ecosystem through a global network of applications. Taking inspiration from significant strides made through the Optimism Collective, the Skate Stewards program lays the foundation for a network that champions interoperability. By harmonizing key applications and solutions across various blockchain technologies, Skate aims to eliminate redundant processes and enable each chain to leverage on each other's strengths. 

Incentive programs such as grants, bounties, developer rewards or token incentives for building and deploying applications on Skate, will be introduced to those contributing to protocol development, or promoting adoption within the developer community. Such programs encourage research and drive innovation among developers.

One of the nuanced criticisms of Skate concerns how it can compete with native apps, which often benefit from advantageous incentives and a deeply entrenched community specific to their individual chains. In response, Skate acknowledges the strengths of native applications but emphasizes the additional value it brings to these ecosystems through interoperability. Skate aims to enhance the reach and functionality of native apps by connecting them to a broader network of chains and communities. This not only exposes native applications to new users and markets but also allows them to participate in a vast, interconnected token economy, potentially multiplying their growth opportunities and incentives.

Another concern is that requiring all executions (on any participating chain) to also execute on the Skatechain might create a bottleneck, especially as the volume of interactions scales up. Critics worry that this could limit scalability and efficiency, centralizing too much processing and decision-making within the Skate protocol. In addressing this criticism, Skate points to its architectural and operational strategies designed to mitigate such risks. These include the use of advanced consensus mechanisms, scaling solutions like sharding or layer 2 technologies, and the practice of offloading certain types of processing to sidechains or specialized nodes within the network. Skate is continuously evolving its technology to ensure that it can handle increasing loads without becoming a central point of failure or inefficiency.

The inception of Skate arose from recognizing user experience constraints and challenges encountered by crypto-natives trying to seamlessly move and utilize assets across different blockchain networks. Currently, 90% of development efforts on EVM chains is spent solely on forking apps that work on Ethereum on another EVM chain. This is clearly an wasteful practice. If not Skate, some protocol will eventually solve that. As the landscape of modular blockchains across thousands of chains continues to evolve, we are committed to staying adaptable and responsive to shifts in market demands. Our goal is to continually bridge gaps across this diverse ecosystem, ensuring that blockchain technology remains accessible and user-friendly for an ever-changing landscape.