Team behind blockchain-powered AI16z bot partners with Stanford to study autonomous crypto-AI agents

Eliza Labs, the team behind the AI16z blockchain-powered AI agent, is partnering with Stanford University to study how autonomous AI bots will integrate with the wider digital asset economy.

The research, which will begin early next year at Stanford’s existing Future of Digital Currency Initiative, will be overseen by two longstanding cryptographers and crypto-focused professors Dan Boneh and David Mazières. Mazières is a co-founder of the Stellar blockchain.

The move comes amid a period of rapid development for the realm of “decentralized AI” as autonomous agents begin operating on social media with little to no human assistance. Projects like AI16z and the Marc-Andreessen-funded Truth Terminal have captured the attention of many in the crypto community and have launched or promoted tokens that have soared in popularity.

Many have predicted that AI agents, which today are programmed using vast swaths of data available online, will naturally turn to internet-native digital currencies.

“Leveraging Eliza Labs’ open-source Eliza framework for autonomous agent development, the partnership will tackle fundamental questions about how AI agents can establish trust, coordinate actions and make decisions within decentralized financial systems,” the team wrote in a press release on Monday.

Eliza Labs is “actively seeking select industry collaborators,” though it is not clear who has been contacted or who will work with the group.

The research will center around three core areas, namely “Agent Trust Mechanisms,” “Multi-Agent Economic Systems” and “Decentralized Agent Governance.” In other words, the researchers will look to establish ways for AI bots to form economies and communities. It will also look into “decentralized governance models” and coordination protocols.

“These developments aim to establish foundational standards for agent interaction in digital economies,” the team writes.

Eliza Labs is the entity behind the AI16z DAO, which holds assets managed by the supposedly autonomous AI bot named Marc AIndreessen. (Neither the famed venture capitalist nor his firm a16z are associated with the project.) AI16z DAO is set up like a hedge fund — which hopes to "flippen a16z" — where real human beings invest in strategies executed by AI Marc. Eliza Labs also builds the tools that enable bots to use social media and the wider internet.

Launched in October, AI16z's token has a market capitalization of over $820 million, according to CoinGecko .

Stanford’s Future of Digital Currency Initiative works with governments, businesses and other institutions to set standards around the emerging role digital currencies play in various sectors.