The Ethereum Foundation (EF) announced on Feb. 19 a brand new interoperability initiative referred to as the Open Intents Framework to streamline cross-chain transactions across Ethereum Digital Machine (EVM)-compatible networks fueled by intents.
The mission will deal with the inefficiencies that come up from navigating the more and more fragmented Ethereum layer-2 (L2) ecosystem. Hyperlane and BootNode help the initiative, which is an open-source, modular infrastructure designed to simplify and speed up intent-based interoperability.
Intents are user-friendly mechanisms that permit transactions to be executed mechanically and optimally across blockchains. Consequently, customers don’t want to discover totally different bridges and decentralized purposes to carry out easy transactions, similar to a swap.
The initiative acquired help from 30 groups from the Ethereum ecosystem, together with the most important layer-2 blockchains by complete worth locked, similar to Arbitrum, Optimism, and Polygon.
Fragmented liquidity
Ethereum’s L2 ecosystem has over $36 billion in complete worth locked, fragmented in 59 rollups, primarily based on L2Beat data.
The announcement highlighted that customers interact with numerous DeFi purposes across networks like Arbitrum, Mode, and Base. Moreover, main tech corporations like Sony have entered the house with their very own L2 options.
Regardless of these developments, the dearth of seamless interoperability across chains stays a major barrier. The muse goals to improve the consumer expertise by leveraging intents to unify the ecosystem, remodeling it from a fragmented assortment of L2s right into a extra cohesive community.
The Open Intent Framework is constructed on the ERC-7683 commonplace, proposed by Uniswap Labs, and the interoperability protocol Across, launched in April 2024. This commonplace facilitates cross-chain intent brokers, enabling smoother interactions between networks.
Nevertheless, whereas intents provide a sublime resolution, their adoption presents challenges. New chains should conduct intensive enterprise improvement to safe help from current protocols.
Modular instruments
Operating a solver — an agent chargeable for executing transactions — requires important funding due to liquidity administration, settlement prices, and ongoing technical upkeep.
To deal with these hurdles, the framework introduces a set of modular instruments designed to simplify the creation and deployment of intent-based protocols. A TypeScript-based solver displays on-chain occasions and executes intents, decreasing reliance on proprietary infrastructure.
Composable sensible contracts permit builders to create and settle intents extra effectively. A customizable consumer interface template can be included to enhance accessibility and adoption.
By standardizing intent execution across Ethereum, the Open Intent Framework allows builders to construct with out reinventing core infrastructure, considerably decreasing time-to-market and operational overhead.