Kinetex is using Succinct's infrastructure for programmable truth to build a BTC bridge
We’re excited to announce that Kinetex Network is building BTCX, a Bitcoin ZK light client for EVM-compatible chains, with Succinct’s infrastructure for programmable truth. Kinetex’s flagship product, Flash Trade, allows users to share trade intents that are resolved by a network of professional market makers. The network’s security relies on storing the canonical states of the source and destination blockchains to validate correct execution. With BTCX, Kinetex Network can verify ZK proofs of Bitcoin’s state roots on Ethereum for just 300K gas, enabling users to securely use BTC for trades within the Ethereum DeFi ecosystem.
Succinct is building core ZK infrastructure, including a decentralized proving network and an open-source zkVM called SP1, that enables any developer to build blockchain applications and infrastructure secured by cryptographic truth, not trust. The decentralized proving network is still under development, but today applications can use the prover network alpha at https://alpha.succinct.xyz/ (a deployment interface for the network) for a seamless developer experience and 1-click hosted proof generation. The proof generation will be migrated to the network once it is live.
The Kinetex team leveraged Succinct’s open-source libraries such as plonky2x and Curta to build optimized circuits for fast proving time. These circuits were deployed on the prover network alpha–making it simple for Kinetex to use ZKPs in production with hosted proof generation and a seamless onchain integration UX. Check out the BTCX project here.
Succinct’s infrastructure makes it easy for all teams, like Kinetex, to build applications based on programmable truth. You can get started with Succinct’s prover network alpha today: https://alpha.succinct.xyz/. If you have any questions or want guidance, you can reach out to us by filling out this form: https://alpha.succinct.xyz/partner
NB: Note that since Bitcoin uses the “longest chain” rule to define the canonical state of the network, a previously accepted chain can be replaced if a new chain demonstrates higher cumulative work. Therefore, the BTCX bridge relies on a strong liveness assumption for proof generation. Kinetex provides liveness through a network of staked nodes (called maintainers) who keep the bridge updated to the latest state.