Projects Built On Top Of StarkEx

Currently, StarkEx has only 4 customers which are industrial-like trading protocols, including dYdX, Immutable, DeversiFi, and Sorare. At the writing time, they attracted $1.14B TVL and processed over 114M transactions on StarkEx, which is an imposing number compared to other existing L2 solutions.

StarkEx Highlighted Numbers

Since StarkEx’s customers are all hand-picked by Starkware which tailored the platform to suit their needs. As a result, 4 projects using ZK-STARKs are highly invested, constructing an ecosystem of DeFi and NFT applications. Let's dive into those 4 protocols.

DeversiFi, Immutable, dYdX, and Sorare Launch Date

dYdX - A derivatives trading platform

dYdX, a derivatives market using an off-chain engine powered by Starkware, stands out to be the largest and the most successful ZK-STARKs project with the leading TVL of around $1B amid the strong market correction. Furthermore, it is now generating the most revenue in the DeFi space (not NFT space) with a total of $334M revenue.

dYdX Revenue

The trading volume number smoked other long-lasting DeFi protocols such as Uniswap, PancakeSwap, MakerDAO, etc. As the biggest derivatives trading platform in crypto, it has a more ambitious dream to reach out to the global derivatives market.

Derivatives Trading Volume On Major Exchanges. Source: Coingecko

dYdX has outperformed Kraken Futures in terms of trading volume since September 2021 while there is almost no signal of growth (moving sideways) on other derivatives centralized exchanges such as Binance Futures and FTX Derivatives. We can expect in the next bull run, dYdX might surpass them by leveraging blockchain technology to the extent of CEX-like experience.

It paved the way for other ZK-STARKs protocols to thrive. With tens of millions of TVL, they’re catching up with dYdX. But in the bigger picture, dYdX has proven the viability of Starkware products, lifting the confidence of StarkNet to take off.

DeversiFi - A suite of trading products

DeversiFi, powered by Starkware, offers a wide range of trading products such as Spot, Margin, Liquidity Provision, and Liquidity Pool. As we can see from the performance of the DEX, it’s still not as big as dYdX in every metric. Recently, Opera, a web browser owning millions of users, has integrated DeversiFi to broadcast crypto to the mainstream.

Nonetheless, DeversiFi will play an important role in the ecosystem as it offers Spot Trading unlike dYdX which only focuses on derivatives. This will create a strong moat for DeversiFi to acquire users when ZK-STARKs are getting adopted.

ImmutableX - An NFT Marketplace

ImmutableX is an NFT platform built on top of Starkware’s technology, famous for Gods Unchained, Guild of Guardians Heros, Nifty Nuggets, and Tiktok Top Moments NFTs.

Sorare - A Football-inspired NFT Collection

Sorare is a football-themed NFT platform using the StarEx Validium technology. The platform has been licensed to collaborate with 215 top-tier football clubs such as Paris Saint-Germain F.C., Real Madrid CF, FC Bayern Munich, etc.

The two NFT-related projects will gain traction from the NFT community as well as football fans. They’re acting as the marketing arm while partnering with Starkware. The strategy seems to underperform since the user base on StarkEx is not so abundant and concentrates on the trading platforms.

StarkNet Ecosystem

As mentioned, StarkNet is the strategic product of Starkware to conquer the L2 market share. After releasing the Alpha version, many crypto builders have been on board the platform and joined hands in developing startups. Numbers of projects on StarkNet:

• DeFi: 13 projects;

• Game & NFTs: 12 projects;

• Wallets: Ledger, Argent, and WalletConnect;

• Tools: Warp, Nethermind, Token Flow, and Equilibrium;

• Others: Snapshot, Yagi, and Zorro;

In addition, protocols on StarkEx (5 projects) are envisioned to migrate to the new permissionless ecosystem StarkNet. These fundamental components are assembled to create an ecosystem on top of Starkware’s technology.

In the DeFi space on StarkNet, there are numerous crypto newcomers building AMM DEX, Aggregator, Liquidity Center, and Derivatives Platform.

MakerDAO is a leading DeFi protocol integrating with StarkNet. It announced plans to integrate its platform with StarkNet via an on-chain proposal (in the voting phase). We think MakerDAO with its decentralized stablecoin DAI will be a huge boost for the ZK-Rollup ecosystem.

Aave, a top-tier lending/borrowing protocol on Ethereum, is making plans to go live on StarkNet through an on-chain proposal (373,380 yays - 0 nays at the writing time). This means the biggest lending protocol on StarkNet likely happens. After the Polygon, Avalanche, and Arbitrum adoptions, Aave reaches out to the new favorable land called StarkNet.

Aave On StarkNet

Projects on StarkNet have released testnet:

• AMM DEX: JediSwap and mySwap.

• NFT: Oasis and Mint Square.

• Bridge: Suez Bridge and Qasr

In late Feb 2022, Starkware launched the fully mainnet version of StarkNet on Ethereum, opening a decentralization phase for the ecosystem. It welcomed more builders to the ecosystem, as evidenced by the steady growth of the project number.

To conclude the new emerging ecosystem StarkNet, we can tell that it is still in the early stage with some primary components. If you’re developers, we think it’s good to give it a try to explore the ecosystem. Additionally, we will discover underlying opportunities in the following section.