InterPlanetary Consensus & Fluence Power the Future of Cloudless Computing
Decentralized computing is entering a new era. InterPlanetary Consensus (IPC) and Fluence are excited to announce the upcoming IPC-powered Fluence Network launch of its decentralized serverless computing platform, which will offer cheaper, provable, and truly decentralized computing for web3 builders.
The collaboration supercharges Fluence’s vision of building an open and verifiable computing platform for the emerging cloudless economy on Filecoin.
What is InterPlanetary Consensus (IPC)?
IPC is a pioneering decentralized scaling technology that bridges the gap between web2’s (cloud) performance and its developer experience, and web3’s decentralized ethos. IPC is built by the creators of Protocol Labs, Filecoin and IPFS to meet the scaling needs of leading web3 builders like Fluence.
IPC is creating a foundational tech stack for planetary-scale web3 networks, to enable the onboarding of billions of users and unlock previously-unattainable decentralized cloud (like Fluence), AI, gaming and social media applications. IPC is built with a novel recursive, fractal-like approach to scaling, dynamic subnets and highly-customizable execution runtimes.
What is Fluence?
Fluence powers the Cloudless internet with a decentralized serverless computing platform. The Fluence DePIN platform frees computation from centralized cloud providers by offering natively decentralized, low cost, and verifiable compute. It makes applications faster to build, easier to integrate, and more secure, allowing developers to focus on improving the user experience.
Fluence also enables a future where AI engines can prove the data on which they were trained and operate on a decentralized network, free from singular points of influence, ensuring transparent, unbiased and uncensored outputs.
Why This Matters: The Promise of Truly Decentralized Computing
IPC provides Fluence with the technological foundation to operate a best-in-class blockchain backend for the Fluence platform and advanced cryptographic proof verification capabilities including the verification of Fluence’s ZKPs such as Proof of Capacity.
With Fluence and IPC, developers are empowered to innovate, create and fairly monetize next-gen web applications ranging from decentralizing services platforms undermining web3 to creating verifiable and auditable data preparation networks supporting ethical and regulatory compliant AI solutions.
Major cloud platforms currently hold significant market positions, but they also come with considerable vendor lock-ins, high costs, centralized control points, and closed systems that restrict user data access. Decentralized computing offers an alternative paradigm for builders seeking openness and user empowerment. However, existing solutions will struggle with aspects like scalability, efficiency, and ease-of-use compared to traditional cloud offerings.
This is where Fluence’s decentralized compute fabric, underpinned by IPC’s recursive scaling capabilities, offers the best of both worlds!
Fluence Supercharged: Building On The Bedrock of IPC
IPC powers Fluence’s high-throughput decentralized network anchored on Filecoin mainnet, customized at various layers to meet Fluence’s decentralized compute needs.
A key enabler of this customization is the Filecoin Virtual Machine, whose flexible hypervisor-inspired architecture makes it possible to deploy custom runtimes, Wasm actors, and native syscalls. Thanks to the latter, the IPC subnet can utilize custom cryptographic primitives, such as efficient proof systems to validate compute integrity, and faster verification of proofs of capacity for onboarding providers.
Fluence subnets benefit from cheap transactions and fast finality, both of which are critical requirements for marketplace interactions, whilst enjoying interconnectivity with the Filecoin L1 thanks to IPC’s General Message Passing mechanisms.
Fluence’s IPC subnet uses the FLT token as its native coin. The canonical FLT token lives in the Ethereum L1, and is bridged atomically to the Filecoin-rooted IPC subnet via Axelar’s Interchain Token Service. The FLT token turns into the subnet’s native circulating supply, where it can be spent by users and compute providers as a gas token.
Users pay for compute jobs in USDC. USDC is brought into the subnet as a “linked token”, where it can move freely in local transactions between clients and providers. Compute providers can then redeem subnet USDC for the root’s USDC by transferring the tokens back to the parent.
IPC also enables faster conditional withdrawals for Fluence platform users to have quick access to their funds, native price oracles to track external asset prices like the FLT token critical for settlement, and ability to process complex provider rewards calculations each block.
Fluence’s IPC subnet is anchored on Filecoin as an L1. Over time, this will give Fluence programs and providers access to Filecoin’s Smart Storage capabilities, enabling them to perform compute on data stored on Filecoin. Likewise, intermediate or final results from those jobs may be stored on Filecoin through this route.
This flexible backbone optimized for Fluence’s workload allows the platform to support an exponential increase in verified compute demand as adoption grows.
From the Founders:
Evgeny Ponomarev, Co Founder of Fluence:
“We love IPC because it enables us to reach our goal: have a high-performant, fast-block, low-fee blockchain secured by the parent chain, and with full customizability. And all of this is close to Filecoin’s largest decentralized data lake, so our users can run compute on it right away!”
Juan Benet, Founder of InterPlanetary Consensus (IPC), Protocol Labs, and Filecoin:
“InterPlanetary Consensus is a pivotal step in unlocking Part 3 of the Filecoin Masterplan: creating a universe of decentralized services that operate on the vast amounts of valuable data stored on the Filecoin network; where each service is an independent, custom L2+ network on top of Filecoin, and the IPC framework interconnects them all seamlessly. Fluence has been a pioneer in spearheading this vision with their adoption of IPC! The world needs drastically better compute infrastructure, which protects our rights through verifiability. Fluence is building a compelling next-generation compute network to do that. I am very impressed with their approach and very excited for the launch of the network! This is a huge milestone for Fluence, for IPC, and for Filecoin.”
Developer Paradise: Building Real Cloudless Apps Today
With this core infrastructure collaboratively developed, what can builders start working on today?
There’s no shortage of ideas that are finally viable in a scalable decentralized environment - ranging from machine learning pipelines to privacy-preserving analytics. Here are just some examples:
- Gather Insights From Data While Respecting User Privacy
- Fluence allows developers to launch analytics, making sure that sensitive user data is not used.
- Enable Compute At Data Source
- Fluence allows developers to bring compute to the data, and data center, not only eliminating bandwidth costs, but mediating if not eliminating data security and privacy concerns while minimizing latency.
Get Started Building with IPC and Fluence Today
IPC opens up web3 scalability for any developer wanting to architect the next big thing in truly scalable decentralized computing. Learn how to get started by visiting the IPC docs.
Calling all Builders and Developers!
The IPC team wants to speak with leading web2 and web3 builders who are seeking a truly scalable blockchain framework that goes beyond the current industry L2 approach. Keen to build the next scalability solution with us? Sign up for the IPC Early Builders Program here. Come talk to the IPC team and meet us at ETHDenver here!
Ready to get started building permissionless, serverless apps? Check out the Fluence Docs.
Calling all Filecoin Storage Providers!
Consider joining Fluence’s compute revolution to earn an extra reward stream. To be integrated with stored Filecoin data soon. Check out the Fluence Docs to get started!
Join us at ETHDenver and DePIN Day!
“Scaling Computation Together: Fluence Launch on IPC”: fireside chat with Juan Benet, founder @ PL / IPFS / Filecoin and Evgeny Ponomarev, co-founder @ Fluence Feb 27th, 4:00 PM | DEPIN DAY <> Fluence Mainnet Launch Event
