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By Validation Cloud’s Chris Matturri and Obol Labs’ Brett Li
Validation Cloud recently joined Obol Network as a Mainnet Alpha Distributed Validator. In this article, we’ll delve into Distributed Validator Technology (DVT), its potential impact on proof-of-stake consensus, and why we’ve partnered with Obol.
What is DVT?
DVT operates as a protocol layer on top of a network, such as Ethereum, for the purpose of facilitating collaboration among validators.
In traditional proof-of-stake, validator responsibilities (i.e., key management, transaction signing, etc.) are handled individually. In contrast, DVT distributes validator responsibilities and tasks to a cluster of nodes. The result is the removal of a single point of failure at the validator level, providing superior resiliency, security, and decentralization to networks. For more on DVT and how it works, check out Obol Network’s blog on the topic, penned by Corver Roos and Brett Li.
Why Validation Cloud is Excited for DVT
As a pioneer in PoS, Validation Cloud has been an integral player in shaping new innovations in the Web3 infrastructure realm. In our view, DVT, while still in its early days, has the opportunity to radically change how consensus layer infrastructure is deployed and managed. For Validation Cloud, as enterprise-scale validators, DVT enhances our capabilities of delivering validators on demand via automated, multi-regional deployments. Specifically, DVT gives us both infrastructure cost and operational advantages, while also delivering heightened resiliency and security.
Looking beyond the horizon, we see a future where DVT is the default configuration for validator operations in PoS. In the same way that the sharing economy step changed the utilization of physical assets, DVT will usher in an exponential increase in validator capacity, moving PoS further toward the ideal balance between performance and decentralization.
Validation Cloud x Obol: Why Validation Cloud is Supporting Obol as a Mainnet Distributed Validator
Obol Network is one of the leading DVT solutions currently building on Ethereum. Obol launched the first-ever Mainnet Distributed Validator in December 2022 and just announced forty-five organizations running DVs on Mainnet, including Validation Cloud.
After evaluating a number of DVT solutions and hearing recommendations from our peers in the industry, we learned a lot about Obol. As part of our company’s roots in joining promising projects at their earliest stages, such as Chainlink and Polygon, we decided to join the Obol testnet. Following testnet, we were thrilled to be invited to participate in their Mainnet Alpha which launched in April, alongside several of our other partners contributing to DVT clusters on Obol.
“We’re excited to be collaborating with Validation Cloud in driving the adoption of distributed validators,” says Brett Li, Chief Growth Officer at Obol Labs. “The innovations Validation Cloud has made around validator performance, availability, and diversity can greatly improve how staking infrastructure is delivered. Adding DVs as a core component can further enhance these critical capabilities.”
Validation Cloud was very impressed by Charon, Obol’s DV middleware, which enables high availability and fault tolerance for validators. Through Obol, Ethereum validators can now be run across multiple nodes working as a cluster while utilizing any combination of existing execution, consensus, and validator clients. Over the past few months working with the Obol team, we quickly learned they share the same goals as Validation Cloud, in building public goods for the Web3 community.
Implementing Obol’s DVT solution will soon make Ethereum more decentralized, improve the diversity of validators, and enhance the security of the ecosystem. These important steps are needed to help usher in the next billion users of Web3.
Validation Cloud is excited to collaborate with the Obol team and our peers in the industry and we eagerly anticipate further advancements in the DVT space. We encourage others to join us! Learn more about Obol at https://obol.tech, and if you’re interested in running Mainnet DVs, please fill out this interest form.
About Validation Cloud
Validation Cloud is a Web3 data streaming and infrastructure company that connects organizations into Web3 through a fast, scalable, and intelligent platform. Headquartered in Zug, Switzerland, Validation Cloud offers highly performant and customizable products in staking, node, and data-as-a-service. Learn more at validationcloud.io| LinkedIn | X
About Obol Labs
The Obol Network is an ecosystem for trust minimized staking that allows people to create, test, run and coordinate distributed validators. Follow Obol at obol.tech or @ObolNetwork.
