In-Depth Analysis of AI Layer 1 Projects: Technological Innovations and Development Trends of Five Leading Platforms

With the rapid development of AI technology, traditional blockchain architectures can no longer meet the high-performance computing and complex data processing needs required by AI applications. This has led to the rise of Layer 1 blockchain platforms specifically optimized for AI, which exhibit diversified characteristics in terms of technical architecture, application scenarios, and business models.

This article provides a depth analysis of five leading AI Layer1 projects: Bittensor, Vana, Kite AI, Nillion, and Sahara.

Bittensor: Decentralized AI Network Infrastructure

Bittensor is committed to building an open decentralized artificial intelligence collaboration network. It has created an open peer-to-peer ecosystem where participants can receive corresponding rewards based on their contributions to the network.

Bittensor's technical architecture adopts a dual-layer structural design:

• Root Network (Mainnet): Responsible for the coordination, verification, and issuance management of the TAO token across the entire system.
• Subnet Ecosystem: Each subnet develops specialized solutions for specific AI application scenarios.

Ecological Development Progress

• The number of subnets has expanded from the initial 32 to over 64, covering various AI application scenarios such as text generation, trading signals, and data labeling.
• The number of active users has reached 140,000, doubling compared to the previous year.
• The total valuation of the subnet market exceeds $100 million, with a daily trading volume maintained at around $45 million.
• The participation of institutions has significantly increased, with well-known funds incorporating TAO into their decentralized AI fund.

The recent dTAO (Dynamic TAO) system upgrade completed by Bittensor is an important innovation in its economic model. The core of this upgrade lies in optimizing the distribution mechanism of the token TAO, shifting from a resource allocation method that relies on the subjective judgment of validators to a more market-oriented distribution mechanism.

The currently most active subnets include:

• Subnet 4 Targon: Focused on AI inference services for text generation
• Subnet 64 Chutes: Provides various LLM API interfaces
• Subnet 8 PTN: Focused on the financial sector, generating trading signals
• Subnet 52 Dojo: Perform data labeling and encourage users to earn tokens through data labeling.

Vana: Data Sovereignty and Value Reconstruction Platform

The Vana project focuses on addressing the issues of ownership and value distribution of personal data. It establishes an ecosystem where users truly own and control their data while being able to gain economic benefits from it.

As an EVM-compatible Layer 1 blockchain network, Vana's technical architecture includes five core components:

1. Data Liquidity Layer: Achieve data asset incentives, aggregation, and verification through data liquidity pools.
2. Data Portability Layer: Ensure that user data can be easily transferred between different applications and AI models.
3. Universal Connection Group: Tracking the real-time data flow across the entire ecosystem
4. Non-custodial data storage: The user's raw data is stored at a location chosen by the user.
5. Application Ecosystem: Developers can leverage the data accumulated from the liquidity pool to build various innovative applications.

Latest Development Trends

• In February 2025, a certain laboratory announced a strategic investment in Vana.
• In terms of ecological construction, Vana has built data projects covering multiple fields, including: Finquarium (financial forecasting data), GPT Data DAO (ChatGPT chat data), Reddit Data DAO (Reddit user data), etc.
• Recently, Vana organized a hackathon, offering a high prize pool to incentivize developers to build DataDAO and AI applications based on Vana data.

Kite AI: Technical Breakthrough of AI-Native Public Chain

Kite AI is a native Layer 1 blockchain project focused on the AI field, built on the Avalanche framework. It proposes four core technological innovations:

1. PoAI Consensus Mechanism: Precisely track the value contribution of data, models, and AI agents through an on-chain verifiable contribution record system.
2. Composable AI subnet: Supports developers to build industry-specific AI collaboration ecosystems on demand.
3. AI Native Execution Layer: Specifically designed to handle AI computing tasks, such as inference, embedding, and fine-tuning/training.
4. Decentralized Data Engine: Ensures that data creators receive fair compensation in the AI workflow.

Development Status

• Kite AI launched the incentive testnet on February 6, 2025.
• Less than 70 hours after the online launch of the test, the number of connected wallets exceeded 100,000, and so far, a total of 1.95 million wallets have joined the incentive test network V1.
• The project background is strong, built by an experienced Silicon Valley team.
• In terms of capital support, the project has received investments from multiple top institutions and has established technical cooperation relationships with several well-known projects.

Nillion: Frontier Exploration of Privacy Computing

Nillion is redefining the way sensitive data is processed through its unique "blind computation" technology. Its technical architecture integrates various cutting-edge privacy protection technologies:

• Multi-Party Computation (MPC )
• Fully Homomorphic Encryption ( FHE )
• Zero Knowledge Proof ( ZKP )
• Nada Language: A domain-specific language designed for creating secure MPC programs

Latest development process

• The Nillion mainnet is scheduled to launch in March 2025.
• Completed a $25 million financing on October 30, 2024.
• Has established integration relationships with multiple mainstream public chains
• In terms of the AI ecosystem, collaborations have been established with multiple AI-related projects.

Sahara AI: Building a New Economy of AI Assets Platform

The core philosophy of Sahara AI is to build a "human-AI collaboration network" that enables ordinary users, developers, and enterprises to participate in the creation, deployment, and monetization of AI assets.

The platform's technical architecture consists of three key components:

1. Sahara Blockchain
2. AI Infrastructure
3. Sahara AI Marketplace

Latest Development Progress

• The Beta version test network of the first phase data service platform will be launched in December 2024.
• The second phase of the testnet will be launched in February 2025
• The public testnet named "SIWA" will be launched on March 10, 2025.
• The roadmap for the 2024-2025 fiscal year has been released, including several key milestones.
• Launch of the incubator program on March 1, 2025, supporting AI x Web3 innovative projects.

AI Layer 1 is currently in a critical phase of rapid evolution, where these platforms are breaking through the limitations of traditional centralized AI systems to build a more open, transparent, and efficient technological ecosystem. In the future, this track will continue to drive technological innovation and advance artificial intelligence towards a more decentralized and collaborative development direction.