Decentralized computing is one of the hottest trends of 2024

Decentralized computing is disrupting the tech landscape. By enabling individuals worldwide to pool their computational resources, it offers a cost-effective, decentralized marketplace - for the first time seriously challenging legacy cloud businesses.

At the core of this technological marvel is the concept of DePINs — Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks. This idea underpins decentralized computing, offering a fresh perspective on building and managing physical infrastructure.

In this short article, we’ll explore the true value behind the DePIN sector, how it’s reshaping the computing solutions of today, and the leading DePIN project that is at the forefront of bringing decentralized computing to life.

What exactly does DePIN stand for?

Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePINs) connect physical infrastructure and blockchain technology, creating a new model for physical infrastructure management.

DePINs are fully decentralized networks where people contribute physical resources such as data storage, wireless connectivity, sensors, or energy grids. In return, individuals are rewarded through token incentives and ownership stakes in the network.

In the same way as DeFi — in which blockchain technology is deployed to decentralize the world of finance — DePINs disrupt the traditional physical infrastructure model.  

In a traditional setting, service providers such as cloud storage businesses build and maintain their infrastructure with large capital expenditure requirements. DePINs turn this around by enabling users to build and coordinate the supply of infrastructure.

A prime example of this in action, is Aethir — a DePIN project that offers cloud computing infrastructure for gaming and AI projects.

Aethir: A prime example of DePIN in action

Aethir provides gamers with access to highly scalable, low-latency GPU resources that offer a high-end gaming experience without the need to buy significant infrastructure.

Gaming, especially cloud gaming, needs a lot of GPU power.

Traditional cloud gaming is often criticized for dedicating a whole GPU to each user, often wasting resources. Aethir's decentralized system pools unused GPU power from different parties and allocates it appropriately — allowing gamers to access processing power from the nearest source, which reduces lag and grants users a smoother experience.

Furthermore, Aethir’s objective is to reward community members for the role they play in the ecosystem with ATH tokens. Users can play, deploy hardware, and most importantly receive compensation for collaborating and having a say in the ecosystem’s development.

And that’s what the DePIN model is all about: 

Fostering a decentralized environment in which participants are compensated for deploying infrastructure and becoming essential builders of the network.

‍

The benefits of DePINs

This brand new approach to physical infrastructure offers some stark contrasts to the traditional model, including:‍

• Affordability — DePINs leverage crowdsourced funding structures and overcome capital expenditure-intensive infrastructure building. This results in an overall far more efficient and for the end user affordable system. 
• Reliability — Since DePINs have a higher number of nodes and are far less dense in the concentration of the network, the chance for single points of failure is minimized. This makes DePINs less corruptible.
• Horizontal Scalability — The distributed nature of DePINs allows the network to expand much more quickly according to specific demand - e.g., in a specific region or for a specific use case.‍
• Efficiency — With DePINs, resources are allocated where they are needed most. In traditional infrastructure decision-making is centralized, which leads to slow reactions to changes in the ecosystem. And this results in over-provisioning, where excess resources are wasted, or under-provisioning, where there are less resources than there is demand. DePIN projects can scale resources dynamically based on demand, and deploy smart contracts to adjust distribution in real-time.‍
• Self-sustainability — Due to token incentives and greater resource allocation, DePINs have the potential to maintain and expand their infrastructure without continuous external monetary investment. In other words, they can turn into their own self-sustaining economy.

‍

The Growing DePIN Market

Even though the DePIN sector is still in its infancy stage, at the time of writing this in June 2024, DePIN Ninja shows the DePIN market cap to be over $40 billion — which is larger than the combined market value of all Decentralized Exchange (DEX) tokens. Furthermore, Messari, an independent crypto research firm, estimates DePIN’s Total Addressable Market to be $2.2 trillion, expected to reach $3.5 trillion by 2028. 

And the underlying reason is clear: DePINs have practical, real-world applications that appeal to the masses. Currently, The DePIN ecosystem has grown to over 650 projects in 2023, spanning across six subsectors: AI, wireless, sensors, energy and services - and, of course, compute.

And it’s in this latter sector where DePIN can really show its potential to unlock more value. In a world powered by data and computation, effective cloud computing systems have become critical.

They are the driving force behind any Google search, the algorithm that recommends individual posts on Instagram, and queries ChatGPT interactions.

These critical systems are in essence an oligopoly in today’s day and age. A few big companies own it all, and leave little to no room for interoperability and innovation. They own the final verdict on what happens to data — controlling what anyone can see, how to transact, and much more.

It’s this stagnation that has led to the need for a more transparent, decentralized alternative to emerge - one built on the essence of DePIN.

‍

How Impossible Cloud Network (ICN) will spearhead cloud infrastructure

Impossible Cloud Network (ICN) is a DePIN initiative at heart, designed to be a decentralized, multi-service cloud platform connecting cloud infrastructure with cloud service providers. Unlike any ordinary DePIN project, ICN aims to unify enterprise-grade global cloud infrastructure under a decentralized framework, with significant business traction already achieved.

Leveraging blockchain technologies, ICN plans to enhance data security, integrity, resiliency, and availability while maintaining high performance and service quality. This will soon be possible through ICN’s Protocol (ICNP), which is designed to facilitate cloud infrastructure and hardware orchestration and incentivize hardware providers to allocate high-performance hardware for any cloud use case.

How? Imagine you’re a cloud service provider struggling with cost-efficient scaling of your product. You will soon be able to join the Impossible Cloud Network and browse the marketplace to find a hardware provider for your specific needs—whether it's additional computing or storage capacity. Impossible Cloud Network’s highly efficient auction mechanism will help you save on business costs and allocate capital more productively. These are the innovative advantages that the Impossible Cloud Network will soon offer to our ecosystem.

In the meantime, we’re launching a series that delves deeper into what sets ICN apart from other DePIN projects. Stay tuned if you want to leverage a decentralized option for your cloud needs. Be sure to stay in the loop and don’t miss out on future research pieces.

‍

You might also want to join our community on Discord (https://discord.gg/icnetwork) to get all the latest news on ICN.

‍

‍