Blockchain Capital: Why Leading 40 Million Investment in ZK Infrastructure Company

By Bart Stephens, Ryan Sproule, Yuan Han Li, Compiler: Zen, PANews

On July 19, RISC Zero, an infrastructure company designed to help developers develop zero-proof software, announced the completion of a $40 million Series A round of financing, led by Blockchain Capital, with participation from Galaxy Digital, IOSG, and others. As the lead investor, Blockchain Capital wrote an article analyzing the development of zero-knowledge computing, the characteristics and advantages of RISC Zero.

Imagine a world where data privacy, security, and trust are no longer concerns, where software supply chains are transparent and verifiable, and where a new generation of applications can harness the power of zero-knowledge computing to solve some of the most pressing challenges of the digital age. This is the promise of zero-knowledge (ZK) computing and why we invested in RISC Zero, a pioneering company that aims to democratize access to ZK through its Bonsai network.

**Zero-knowledge computing is a revolutionary primitive that allows applications and protocols to exploit the three key properties of simplicity, correctness, and zero-knowledge. This means that by verifying a ZK proof (correctness), a verifier can know with a near-exact guarantee that a computation was performed correctly. **

Furthermore, the verified proof will be much more concise than the original computation, and the zero-knowledge property of the proof can also be exploited to ensure that the verifier knows nothing about the computation itself. This unique combination of properties has far-reaching implications and provides a new way to verify information. Together, these properties balance the need for privacy, security, and trust, offering the potential for a safer and more private digital world. But there are still some hurdles before ZK can reach its full potential.

**First, running calculations in ZK is too time-consuming and expensive. **Proof time and cost need to drop dramatically to enable complex calculations in ZK. The good news is that these are declining dramatically: the trajectories of ZK proof times and costs have followed familiar trends in the history of technology—whether it’s Moore’s Law (the cost of computing is halved every two years), Flatley’s Law (the cost of sequencing the human slow rate of decline) or Clyde's Law (disk density doubles approximately every 13 months). Recent architectural advances in proof systems (Plonky2, Hyperplonk, STARK) and advances in underlying cryptography (Poseidon) reduce the overhead required to create ZK proofs of any computation. And progress in these areas will continue to happen at a similar pace (especially the recent influx of talent into ZK), proving that overhead will also benefit from advances in hardware acceleration (MSM, NTT), something that has so far been underexploited.

**Another huge hurdle to mass adoption of ZK is the highly complex mathematics and cryptography inherent in ZK systems. **The depth and level of expertise required to drive ZK innovation is only available to a small group of highly skilled technology developers.

Ideally, developers would be free to write programs in their favorite language while still being able to prove computations with zero-knowledge without having to hand-write input and design circuits in a low-level, ZK-specific programming language. This is where RISC Zero's Bonsai platform is a game changer for developers worldwide, and why we invested in RISC Zero.

By creating a zero-knowledge virtual machine (zkVM) that emulates the RISC-V instruction set architecture (ISA), RISC Zero built a system capable of proving low-level code execution. Since the ISA is a bridge between human-readable code and machine-interpretable instructions, this achievement means that the Bonsai network can prove that any high-level program can be compiled to this architecture. Since most modern programming languages are RISC-V compatible, RISC Zero's Bonsai is able to execute virtually any arbitrary computer program with zero knowledge.

In a future where zero-knowledge (ZK) computing becomes common, many previously impossible applications will become possible. This includes not only Ethereum-based applications utilizing RISC Zero’s Bonsai network as a coprocessor (performing resource-intensive off-chain work before validating on-chain results), but will also extend beyond cryptocurrencies. Bonsai, for example, lets white hat hackers prove the existence of security holes and bugs without directly disclosing them. It can also prevent future supply chain attacks on software by allowing users to download and verify ZK proofs to ensure the code they run is pre-audited in Bonsai. Most excitingly, the widespread adoption of Bonsai could lead to entirely new use cases not yet imagined.

In addition to the impressive technological breakthrough, there is a strong and unique team behind RISC Zero. The three co-founders Brian Retford, Jeremy Bruestle and Frank Laub have known each other for over 20 years. Their shared experience includes co-founding several companies, most recently a venture into AI optimization and compilation that was eventually acquired by Intel.

Each member of the trio brings a wealth of experience to RISC Zero: Brian has worked on pricing and metering systems at Google Cloud Platform; Jeremy is a lifelong math enthusiast working on GPU acceleration for genetic sequencing, and With a background in cryptography, high performance computing (HPC), and security; Frank has a strong background in compilers and has built numerous codebases. With a shared history and diverse skill sets, the RISC Zero team is uniquely positioned to bring zero-knowledge computing to the masses, potentially reshaping the digital landscape in the process.

As we look to a future where zero-knowledge computing is widely available, the possibilities for innovation are endless. Capable of supporting a wide range of programming languages, RISC Zero's Bonsai network will democratize ZK computing and enable developers to create secure, private, and trustless applications in various domains. From strengthening cybersecurity measures to enhancing trust in software supply chains to dramatically increasing the computing power available to on-chain applications, the potential impact of zero-knowledge computing is enormous. Rapidly declining ZK proof times and costs, RISC Zero's loyal team, and the emergence of Bonsai as a versatile computing platform herald a new era of computing—with privacy, security, and trust built into the fabric of our digital world.