Exclusive interview with Alex, founder of deBridge: Building a liquid internet

Original｜Odaily Planet Daily

Author: jk

As the field of decentralized financial infrastructure continues to evolve, the latest developments of deBridge have attracted widespread attention. From a hackathon winner to one of the largest bridges on Solana, deBridge has gradually become the largest player in this field.

Odaily Planet Daily had the honor of interviewing Alex, the founder of deBridge, and discussed in depth how deBridge redefines the liquidity and governance mechanism of cross-chain assets through its innovative liquidity Internet construction and the upcoming DBR token; at the same time, it also included the points mechanism and second season related activities that users are most concerned about.

Alex also shared insights on the milestones that the deBridge community and users should look forward to most in the coming months, as well as his grand vision for the future development of deBridge. Let’s hear how Alex explains the unique value of deBridge and how it can lead innovative changes in the wave of decentralized finance.

Alex, founder of deBridge. Source: deBridge

The following is the full interview:

Odaily:

Great to meet you, Alex! We are very lucky to have the opportunity to speak with the deBridge team. First, can you introduce yourself and the deBridge team and explain what your project does?

Alex:

Of course. Thank you for inviting me to the interview today. My name is Alex, and I am the CEO and co-founder of deBridge. But I would prefer you to call me a core contributor to deBridge, especially as we are in the process of transforming into a DAO. Basically, we are building the Internet of Liquidity.

deBridge is considered the fastest and most secure bridge on the market. We started our journey in early 2021 and we have undergone significant changes since then. We initially gained attention after winning the Chainlink Global Hackathon. Yes, we started as a hackathon project, but we have grown rapidly in the past three and a half years. From the beginning, our goal has been to enable the free flow of information and liquidity.

The reason we started working on the bridge was to solve the problem of liquidity transfer. Our team was involved in cross-chain arbitrage and needed to rebalance our inventory using centralized exchanges. However, we often faced challenges with centralized exchanges, such as delayed withdrawals or insufficient hot wallet liquidity. We realized that a truly decentralized technology was needed to facilitate the transfer of information and liquidity.

We have been working on this mission for quite some time. As you may know, security is the biggest challenge in this space. We are proud that deBridge has not experienced a single vulnerability or security breach to date. Our bridge infrastructure has maintained 100% uptime since day one. Moreover, we are known as the fastest bridge because we adopt a unique model that is different from traditional cross-chain infrastructure.

Odaily:

Thanks for the introduction. Let’s dig into the product side of deBridge specifically. We noticed some impressive numbers, especially the widespread use of deBridge between EVM chains and Solana. For example, in June, the total amount of assets launched on Solana was $280 million, of which $154 million went through deBridge, compared to $125 million through Wormhole. These are pretty impressive numbers.

What metrics does your team consider when deciding which chains to support? Do you consider growth in specific areas, such as farming, meme tokens, or staking on a chain? What are the key metrics you consider?

Alex:

That’s a good question. Initially, we started developing deBridge for the EVM chain because any cross-chain infrastructure consists of two layers: the protocol layer, which is basically the smart contracts deployed on each chain; and the infrastructure layer, which involves the validator nodes that sign and verify cross-chain messages. EVM was an obvious choice at the time because the entire DeFi space was originally built around the EVM and was mainly centered on Ethereum.

As we saw more layer-2 solutions emerge, we started thinking about what would be the first non-EVM chain we should support. We had several internal discussions and considered the various technology stacks and ecosystems that had developed around 2021. Ultimately, we decided to support Solana because we are excited about the development and growth of its ecosystem.

It all started with a small $20,000 grant we received from the Solana ecosystem, which became the starting point for our long-term involvement. We spent about two years building the protocol layer, infrastructure, and everything necessary to be able to adapt when the mainnet launches. Today, deBridge is one of the main bridges in the Solana ecosystem, and a large part of the liquidity inflows and trading volume is handled through our infrastructure.

Our goal is to make deBridge truly decentralized in terms of scaling and deciding which chains to support. As I mentioned before, we are building the Internet of Liquidity for DeFi. One of the huge advantages of the internet is that it is permissionless - you dont need permissions to visit a website or connect to the internet. We believe this concept should also apply to DeFi. Any blockchain ecosystem should be able to connect to deBridge and communicate seamlessly with any other supported blockchain.

To do this, we developed a unique framework called IaaS, which stands for “Interoperability as a Service”.

This is almost like the SaaS model that is very popular in the Web2 space. For IaaS (Interoperability as a Service), any blockchain ecosystem can initiate a subscription through a smart contract, pay $10,000 per month, and connect to deBridge immediately.

The biggest problem right now is that if you are building your own chain or a layer 2 solution, you absolutely need a bridge because it is fundamental. However, if you approach most popular bridge providers, they usually require millions of dollars in funding or a large amount of liquidity to be supplied to their pool, which is not feasible for everyone. With deBridge, you do not need to negotiate with our team or request an integration. You can simply initiate a subscription through a smart contract and the deBridge infrastructure will be deployed on your chain. Our validators will automatically establish a connection with your chain.

Solvers in our liquidity network will automatically see all transactions created in and out of your ecosystem and decide whether to satisfy them. This is how we achieve the Internet of Liquidity.

So far, deBridge has two types of IaaS adapters. The first is EVM, allowing any EVM-compatible chain to connect. The second is SVM, enabling any Solana-compatible or general ecosystem to connect. We are further considering how to enable connectivity for more complex chains such as Aptos, Sui, or Cosmos. The next step for this framework will be IaaS adapters, leveraging our codebase of existing adapters to allow anyone to build their own adapters for more complex chains.

For example, a developer can port a deBridge smart contract from Solidity or Rust to a specific chain’s language, audit it, deploy the smart contract, and then connect to deBridge in the same way. We believe that anyone should be able to build, and as we transition to a DAO, a large part of our efforts and funding will likely be focused on incentivizing developers to connect more blockchain ecosystems.

So, this is how we envision the future of deBridge.

Odaily:

So, the next question is, what are the big upcoming events in deBridge’s product roadmap?

Alex:

That’s a good question. The next biggest milestone is the launch of our token and transition to a DAO. So far, deBridge is one of the fastest growing bridges and the only one that has successfully established an efficient value capture mechanism.

deBridge is not only fast, but it is also the first bridge to reach the break-even point. It generates sustainable profits every day because any user who initiates a transaction or makes a cross-chain transfer is required to pay fees. In our case, these fees are used for security and speed, making deBridge the most secure bridge on the market. Users want to have confidence that their actions or token approvals will not result in the loss of funds.

Simply building a bridge is not enough. If you don’t have fees, you can inflate metrics and volumes, but without effective value capture mechanisms, those metrics are meaningless. You can plug in any wallet, but the real challenge is building an efficient bridge with sustainable economics — one that not only achieves meaningful metrics, but also generates value accumulation that funnels fees into the treasury. Without these value accumulation mechanisms, you can’t build a truly decentralized protocol or ecosystem.

In my opinion, deBridge may be the first bridge to achieve this. If you look at platforms like Token Terminal or DeFiLlama, deBridge is one of the bridges that generates the largest fees. So far, we have accumulated about $12 million in the protocol treasury, which is a considerable amount - in fact, more than the total funds we have ever raised.

Sorry, maybe that’s a little off topic. But regarding the roadmap - an important step is the launch of the token, which is indeed a key step in the transition to a DAO. However, we are also steadily executing our mission to build the “Internet of Liquidity” for DeFi, which involves the development of many improvements and new product features.

One particularly interesting direction we are working on is custody, similar to what existed before with Bitcoin. We plan to bring native Bitcoin to Solana to enable native cross-chain trading of existing assets between Solana, other EVM chains, and native BTC. Basically, you will be able to deposit BTC to a specific address on the Bitcoin chain and receive SOL on Solana or MATIC on Polygon. This will be a major improvement in terms of user experience and liquidity, as Bitcoin is one of the largest assets by market cap in the crypto market.

Additionally, we are focused on scalability and supporting new chains. We think Tron could be a valuable addition to deBridge because there is a lot of liquidity there. Currently, no bridge can effectively handle the large transaction volumes on Tron, so enabling the transfer of assets like USDT between Tron and other ecosystems could be a significant value unlock.

We are also working to improve the liquidity network of deBridge, our unique “zero TVL” model for cross-chain asset transfers. Traditional bridges rely on liquidity pools, which have multiple bottlenecks in terms of security, scalability, and capital efficiency. Liquidity pools are susceptible to major vulnerabilities. We pioneered the zero TVL model for cross-chain transfers, and now we are enhancing it further - making it faster, and minimizing operational costs for users and dApps. As a result, GLM (Gas-free liquidity mining) will become more affordable for users and solvers, improving the user experience and expanding its utility.

Additionally, we are developing user-requested features. One of them is Gas-free operations. For example, anyone can initiate a Gas-free cross-chain transaction without signing or broadcasting the transaction. Instead, you can simply sign a cryptographic message (such as a permission), and the Solver will broadcast the transaction on your behalf, completing your transaction immediately on the target chain. This feature also allows Gas separation, making it possible to develop interesting Social Finance (SocialFi) mechanisms on deBridge, such as copy trading.

Or even different Telegram embedded bots or embedded applications, where users can participate in copy trading or delegate their liquidity to a specific vault to have others execute trades on their behalf. There are a lot of interesting mechanisms that can be developed, but Gas separation for cross-chain operations will be a significant user experience improvement. Another interesting feature is Gas-free cancellation, where users will not need to broadcast a transaction if an intended transaction cannot be carried out. Instead, they will be able to cancel that intended transaction in a completely Gas-free manner.

So, these are some of the product features and plans we have in mind.

Odaily:

Let’s talk about technical solutions: What type of technical solutions does deBridge choose when transferring assets across chains? What are the advantages and boundaries of your solution in terms of efficiency and security?

Alex:

Good question, let me explain the difference first: Historically, most bridges were built as liquidity protocols, which means that settlement or cross-chain transfers happen in liquidity pools. How it works is that you put your assets into a pool on one chain and then wait for the transaction to be completed, which can sometimes take up to 20 minutes, for example on Polygon, where final confirmation takes a long time.

After those 20 minutes, your transfer will be settled from the liquidity pool on the target chain. However, this model is fundamentally flawed. It is synchronous, which means that automated market makers (AMMs) are required in many cases, and price discovery happens through Curve. In addition, the liquidity pool itself is a bottleneck. For example, if there is only $2 million of liquidity in the pool, you cant transfer $3 million or $4 million because there wont be enough liquidity for settlement. In addition, there is slippage - you dont know how much you will receive in the end. While waiting for the transaction to be finalized, others may send large transactions before you, causing your transaction to be reversed due to slippage or insufficient liquidity, or you may receive much less than expected, which is a big problem for user experience.

Another issue is capital efficiency. In order to attract liquidity to these pools, you need to spend a lot of money on rewards and liquidity incentives. For example, US Treasuries now pay about 6% annually, while bridges, due to their higher risk, must pay at least 15%. Imagine a bridge with a total value locked (TVL) of $100 million - this means at least $15 million in interest payments to liquidity providers per year. In order to cover these fees, the bridge would need to generate more than $15 million in fees, which is almost impossible. This is why this model is not capital efficient and liquidity will always drain away from these types of solutions in the long run.

The last question is security. If a bridge has a TVL of $100 million, it becomes a prime target for exploitation. This is why we see so many hacks in the cross-chain space. If you interact with a bridge with a high TVL, it is inherently risky in my opinion.

We recognized these deficiencies early on and started thinking about how we could move our model from being pool-based to more of a zero-TV design or network model where we didn’t rely on pools for settlement but took a different approach.

We can use solvers or private market makers, and we came up with this “zero TVL” design. How it works is that anyone can create an intent that basically says, “Okay, I’m offering 100 USDC on Polygon, anyone can give me 99 USDC on Solana.” This intent is like a limit order. Any solver or market maker on Solana will immediately see this intent, and the first person to offer 99 USDC will be able to send a cross-chain message to Polygon, unlocking the liquidity that I provided as a user. Small spreads — like $1 in this example — are how this design works, and it’s very efficient.

The key advantage here is that there is no static locked liquidity. Instead, a solver or market maker completes the trade while maintaining their own liquidity, either in their wallet or on their balance sheet. This liquidity only interacts with the smart contract for a very short time during settlement. Another interesting aspect is that the solver takes on all the risks of the user, including those associated with trade finality and reorganization. This is their profession and they are rewarded for it.

Therefore, users do not need to wait 10 or 20 minutes. Solver manages finality risk, which is why settlement is usually completed in seconds. This makes deBridge the fastest technology by design. In addition, it is capital efficient. deBridge does not need to provide incentives to attract liquidity because in this zero TVL design, there is no locked liquidity at all. If there is no locked liquidity, there is nothing to hack, making the model significantly more secure.

Another key point is that users know the exact output they will receive, eliminating slippage. When a user creates a trade, they can specify the exact parameters. For example, I can specify that I am providing 1 USDC on Polygon and want to receive 1,000 SOL on Solana. While no solver will fulfill such an order, I still have control over the execution price. If the trade is profitable — for example, if I provide 1 SOL for $200 — then solvers will compete to execute the trade. This way, I know how much I will receive and don’t have to worry about slippage or AMM-based price discovery.

For example, if I want to buy something, like a hoodie that costs $100, I don’t want to pay $101 or $99 due to slippage. This precise cutting capability is only possible with deBridge’s liquidity network.

So, this is the comparison between the traditional approach and our zero TVL design, highlighting the advantages and addressing the issues of each approach.

Odaily:

In fact, we noticed an example where a market maker recently executed the largest single cross-chain transfer on Solana — $4 million in USDC. If you are familiar with this case, can you walk us through how deBridge handled it and how this example highlights deBridge’s capabilities?

Alex:

Yes, absolutely. This is indeed one of the largest transfers we settle. This particular transfer was facilitated by Wintermute, a market maker. These market makers typically spread liquidity across different chains and their goal is to optimize the market through arbitrage or MEV (maximum extractable value). If they have liquidity, they want to make it work, so intent or settlement capabilities can be added to their infrastructure.

In this $4 million transfer, it was from Ethereum to Solana, and a large fund needed to move liquidity quickly. In times of market volatility, you can’t rely on centralized exchanges, as they typically require 64 block confirmations, and waiting that long is risky when facing liquidation or hoping to buy an asset when the price drops. This is where deBridge comes in — it’s the fastest solution, giving users a first-mover advantage, whether they want to buy something or manage liquidity more efficiently and securely.

In this case, the fund needed to quickly move liquidity from Ethereum to Solana. They created this large transfer, but the small Solvers in the deBridge network couldnt handle it because they didnt have enough liquidity. Wintermute took on this transfer, and its worth noting that the person who moved the liquidity to Solana immediately deposited it into Drift to start trading. I saw Cindy, the founder of Drift, tweet about this, and its a cool example of composability in DeFi. People dont have to worry about where their assets are or on which chain - they can move assets across chains freely and instantly. This is how the Internet of Liquidity works.

Odaily:

Absolutely, that’s really cool. We know deBridge is entering phase 2 of the points program. What kind of benefits can users expect?

Alex:

The points system is a way for us to measure the contribution of each user or partner to the overall success of the deBridge ecosystem.

We redesigned the points system to distribute points in an interesting way, with points proportional to fees paid to the protocol. Fees act as an effective monetary barrier, helping to reduce Sybil attack vectors, where people might try to get free airdrops by burning gas.

In deBridge, we have had fees from day one, so all users know they are paying a small fee for security, speed, and decentralization. We launched this points campaign as the first to make it proportional to the fees generated by the protocol - basically 100 points per $1 spent. We created a leaderboard showing statistics and protocol activity for all addresses interacting with the deBridge infrastructure.

Additionally, we have added a referral component. For example, integrators like Jupiter using deBridge can earn 25% of the referral points generated by their users. Similarly, active community members or leaders who share referral links on their blogs or social media will also earn 25% of their referral generated points. This approach is similar to the referral programs used by centralized exchanges to incentivize people to spread the technology.

Our goal has always been to build decentralized governance without venture capitalists dominating, which is why we havent raised a large marketing budget. Instead, our marketing ambassadors are our users - people who are impressed by the speed and security of deBridge and naturally spread the word to their friends and family. Points campaigns are an effective way to communicate with our community and incentivize them to use the protocol. You can think of it like an airline mileage program. For example, I choose to fly Emirates because I like to accumulate miles and then use them for upgrades, which brings me benefits. Its an effective user acquisition tool.

The points campaign has worked really well for deBridge. We designed and developed it as part of our platform. Season 1 recently concluded and translated into an airdrop of the initial token allocation, which will be the largest allocation to the community. After the snapshot, we will start Season 2, which is essentially a continuation of the program. The deBridge DAO we envision for the future will have three key stakeholder groups.

First, lets talk about the community. We have a section called Community Launch that allocates 20% of the total token supply. This will be distributed over three and a half years. The same allocation applies to core contributors - 20% over the same time period. In addition, we have reserved 20% for our strategic partners who supported us in the early stages of deBridge, before we generated any revenue, and have continued to support us over the past three and a half years.

Thanks to this balanced approach and the minimal amount of money we raised, we can maintain a healthy distribution, with each stakeholder group - community, core contributors, and strategic partners - ultimately holding approximately 20% of the total supply. These distributions will vest gradually and quarterly over this period.

The first season of our points campaign has just ended, and 6% of the total supply will be distributed to users and participants. The remaining supply will be distributed in future points campaigns. Season 2 starts immediately after the end of Season 1, continuing to incentivize users. If you use deBridge to make cross-chain transfers, you will earn points reflected on the application banner. You can also view all statistics and explore your points. These points make you eligible for future token distributions, which will be managed by the DAO.

This system doesn’t just apply to users; it also includes integration partners. For example, wallets that integrate the deBridge API or widget will be eligible for these distributions as they accumulate referral points. This is the mechanism we have established for point campaigns and token distribution.

Odaily:

Thank you very much. How has the community responded to Phase 1? Has everything been smooth sailing, or have there been any challenges?

Alex:

Yes, of course. First of all, you can never please everyone, right? Thats the way the world works - there are always some extremes. When you satisfy one group, it may mean that another group is not as satisfied. Its like Newtons third law in a way.

Overall, we are optimizing deBridge to serve loyal users and those who have been with us for a long time and understand our long-term vision to build the liquidity internet of DeFi. In any points campaign, you will have different users - some are really invested in the project, while others just want a quick airdrop. Historically, there have been several large airdrops, such as the Arbitrum and Uniswap airdrops, where people, including myself, made some transactions and suddenly received $2,000 worth of tokens. It was like magic because no one expected it and airdrops were not popular at the time.

But now, some groups expect this to continue forever, thinking that the protocol will keep airdropping free money. However, economics always follow certain rules, there is no magic - only math. With my math background, I always try to understand where value comes from. At deBridge, we are building a sustainable company, so we focus on our long-term users.

Generally speaking, when it comes to Season 1, most of our loyal users and those who understand our long-term vision are satisfied and happy. However, those who are primarily interested in the airdrop might not be so satisfied. One of the main complaints we received was about the timeline. The deBridge Foundation announced the airdrop checker, where anyone can connect their address and see their airdrop allocation. The top 10% of the Season 1 leaderboard users were locked, meaning they got 50% on the first day and the remaining 50% after six months. Some users were unhappy with this and said, Look, you made us hold tokens for six months. We are not happy. This is a valid concern.

I’m excited about both groups of people – our long-term supporters and those who are short-term players.

But it’s true that some people were unhappy with having to wait six months — they wanted it to happen faster. So we listened to their feedback, and the deBridge Foundation introduced an additional feature that allows them to claim their tokens early for a 20% penalty. This penalty will be redistributed to those who are willing to wait six months.

This is actually an interesting mechanism that allows us to differentiate between loyal users who see long-term value and understand our vision, and those who are more short-term users or airdrop hunters looking for a quick flip. We respect both groups of people because they each play an important role.

We often discuss ideas with the community to see what they think and what they suggest. If the feedback makes sense, were willing to adapt or implement something new. If not, we dont pay attention. But there are a lot of smart people in our community who make great suggestions, and we try to listen to them. The 20% penalty feature was a particularly good suggestion that the deBridge Foundation adopted. I think most people are very excited about it. We saw over 1,200 likes on the foundation announcement, and I think well break 1 million views on that tweet soon. So thats great to see, and it shows that were moving in the right direction.

Odaily:

So, the next question is about DBR – can you share any data or details about DBR’s launch on the LFG Launchpad?

Alex:

LFG Launchpad is a way to bootstrap on-chain liquidity and is actually the largest launchpad in the Solana ecosystem, built by the Jupiter team. The Jupiter team is amazing and their DAO is one of the largest. Im always impressed by how they think about user experience, and at deBridge, we actually took a lot of inspiration from Jupiter. Were lucky to be involved in LFG Launchpad, and the Jupiter DAO voted for deBridge.

The way it works is that at some point, the token needs to become tradable and go through a market. The challenge is how to have a fair launch so that the token isn’t just traded by MEV bots or dominated by venture capitalists, but that everyone has a fair chance to participate in the launch. That’s what LFG is about — it’s built to bootstrap on-chain liquidity for tokens, especially in the Solana ecosystem, which is perfect for deBridge.

We designed our LFG in a unique way. This is not a classic Jupiter mode launch, although those are great too. In our case, the LFG event will be super unique.

Only eligible addresses can participate, and eligibility is determined by loyalty. Specifically, users who have used deBridge on at least 10 different days will be able to deposit into the LFG vault. Additionally, users who have staked a certain amount of Jupiter (I believe it is over 600 JUP) will also be eligible. This information is detailed on the Jupiter Research forum. Therefore, people in the top 10% of JUP stakers will be able to participate and deposit into the LFG vault.

This is how the mechanism will work, everyone will get tokens at the same price. The secured liquidity will be used to bootstrap on-chain liquidity pools on Meteora, specifically the Meteora Dynamic Pool. Another interesting aspect is that each address will be limited - not only do participants need to be whitelisted or eligible, but their deposits are also limited. The limit is set at $25,000, which ensures that no single whale can deposit $10 million and dominate the pool.

This approach ensures a fair distribution and fair on-chain liquidity launch. We have two distribution processes: an airdrop that everyone can claim, and the LFG liquidity bootstrapping mechanism. Tokens from both distributions will be available to claim at the same time, and everyone has equal rights in when and how to claim.

Odaily:

Thank you, in addition to this, our readers are particularly concerned about the utility of the token. From a demand perspective, can you explain the use case of DBR and future plans related to it?

Alex:

Of course. DBR will be a utility token, and its primary use will be governance. All token holders will be able to participate in the DAOs decision-making process. They can make suggestions on various matters, such as which chains should be integrated through the IaaS framework, which product features should be prioritized for implementation, or how the DAOs treasury should be managed.

For example, deBridge has accumulated approximately $12 million in transaction fees, which will be controlled by the DAO. Token holders will have a say in how these funds are used — whether for protocol development, allocating incentives to certain partners or integrators, or other purposes. Governance of the treasury will be an important responsibility of token holders.

The second use of DBR is staking. To participate in governance, token holders need to stake their tokens and use their staking power to vote on various proposals. These proposals may include adjusting key parameters such as transaction fees, managing the list of active validators, or rotating validators when needed. Basically, token holders will have the power to control the entire protocol.

Odaily:

Here’s the final question: Looking ahead, we’d like to know what the next major milestone for deBridge will be? What upcoming features or initiatives should users expect?

Alex:

The token launch is definitely a major milestone, which requires a lot of preparation. But I think the transition to a DAO is another very important step. This is the key to making the Internet of Liquidity truly unstoppable.

In terms of product features, there are several exciting developments. For example, we are working on integrating with new chains, such as Tron, which will be available in the near future. We are also focusing on gasless transactions, which will allow users to perform gasless cancels, and enable more complex operations such as DCA. This will allow large transactions to be broken into smaller transactions, spread out over a certain period of time.

We recently launched P2P functionality on the deBridge Liquidity Network (DLN), which allows for more customized trades where you can specify the other party’s address — ideal for OTC trades, for example. This is a pretty cool addition.

Another important area is custody. We have dePort, which is our custody solution that allows assets to be transferred from one chain to another, effectively creating derivatives of them. The next big milestone for deBridge will be to enable custody for BTC, allowing users to trade native BTC on any asset on any other chain.

Additionally, we are working on improving various issues related to transaction costs and gas efficiency to make the protocol more cost-effective for users. Staking is also an important upcoming feature that provides another level of utility to the token. Users will be able to stake and participate in governance.

These are the major milestones and functional developments we are currently focusing on.