Cardano Foundation Quarterly: Q1 2025

To further realize Cardano's potential as a public digital infrastructure, the Foundation fosters meaningful engagement with both traditional sectors and Web 3.0 participants. This collaborative approach supports the development of key initiatives within three distinct yet interconnected verticals: traceability, authenticity, and sustainability. By exploring Cardano’s strengths across these verticals, we aim to address critical global challenges by delivering high-impact, real-world solutions for businesses and consumers alike.

From strategic partnerships to product launches and policy engagement, Q1 2025 showcased these multifaceted contributions. Specifically, the quarter’s initiatives reflected a continued focus on key areas: operational resilience, adoption, and education, encompassing both technical and practical aspects.

Empowering resilience through collaboration and research

Spotlighting network resilience remains a core aspect of the Foundation’s mission to highlight Cardano’s scalability, transparency, and overall longevity. As such, Q1 efforts continued to focus on showcasing the blockchain’s technical underpinnings and practical governance enhancements.

To promote a broader understanding of blockchain architecture, the Foundation started 2025 by publishing an article on Merkle Patricia Tries. With contributions from Matthias Benkort, Technical Director of Open-Source Development, the post examined how these cryptographic data structures facilitate the organization and verification of information in decentralized environments, providing a foundation for secure smart contract execution.

In February, we outlined our secure and scalable voting approach for Fund 13 of Project Catalyst in support of governance transparency and participation. The Foundation’s wallet structure, shaped by its SPO delegation strategy and internal key management requirements, necessitates dividing funds into tranches, each subject to strict operational constraints. By implementing an approach that associated multiple stake keys with a single voting key, we avoided compromising security or efficiency. This implementation also supported meaningful participation in Catalyst voting, preserved delegation principles, and prevented unsustainable workflows.

The Foundation further highlighted its support for academic research with two major publication announcements in the same month. The Cardano Economic Parameters whitepaper, authored by Professor Massimo Morini, offered an in-depth analysis of Cardano’s monetary policy and tokenomics, exploring mechanisms designed to support long-term sustainability and economic resilience. Additionally, the Serial Monopoly on Blockchain with Quasi-patient Users paper, co-authored with Paolo Penna (IOG Research) and Manvir Schneider, Senior Research Scientist at the Foundation, critically examined platform dynamics and user behavior in blockchain ecosystems. These research outputs contribute to broader academic conversations while reinforcing the Foundation’s evidence-driven approach to blockchain adoption.

Driving adoption with ecosystem insights

The Foundation engages regularly with policymakers, regulators, and global institutions to help shape the future of blockchain policy and infrastructure. At the same time, we continue to showcase blockchain’s transformative potential through strategic partnerships, exploratory use cases, and robust outreach. These activities demonstrate Cardano’s capacity to solve enterprise and public-sector challenges.

In January, CEO Frederik Gregaard participated in two side events at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, delivering sessions that addressed ecosystem vision and startup innovation, as well as highlighted the critical role of public blockchains in building digital trust systems. In addition to these discussions, Gregaard unveiled the Cardano Ecosystem Guide 2025—a comprehensive overview of community and enterprise participation, showcasing the vibrancy and breadth of the ecosystem.

In the same month, the Foundation published the 2024 Activity Report, a detailed account of its strategic achievements, partnerships, governance contributions, and ecosystem growth. The report served as a clear statement of accountability and ambition, underscoring the Foundation’s role in building resilient infrastructure, supporting adoption, and promoting education across the Cardano ecosystem.

The first quarter also saw the Cardano Foundation forge strategic partnerships and highlight impactful real-world applications. A key collaboration with Serviceplan Group positioned Cardano as critical infrastructure for artificial intelligence (AI), exemplified by the launch of Masumi with NMKR. This decentralized network for AI agents showcases the convergence of blockchain and AI, signaling enterprise interest in public blockchain for future innovation.

To demonstrate practical solutions, the Foundation published case studies on Masumi and RE-TWIN, with the latter developed by Tokenance and YurekAI. RE-TWIN leverages Cardano to create secure digital twins for real estate, streamlining property transactions and enhancing transparency. These initiatives, alongside refreshed resources focused on sustainability and authenticity, underscore Cardano’s versatility and growing adoption by enterprises seeking robust and innovative blockchain solutions.

A global approach to blockchain adoption

At the Check Point Conference 2025 in February, Chief Technology Officer Giorgio Zinetti presented a joint session with Dan Danay on a Catalyst-supported Web 3.0 threat detection system, underscoring the Foundation’s commitment to real-time cybersecurity solutions in decentralized environments. In the same month at RWA Paris, Zinetti represented the Foundation during the “Blockchain Infrastructure & Development: Building the Foundations for Web3 and RWA Integration” panel. He also participated in the “Bridging Blockchains, Building Businesses” session at the GFTN Forum in Japan, highlighting Cardano’s role in enabling enterprise collaboration through decentralized infrastructure.

The Foundation also formalized a strategic collaboration with SERPRO, Brazil’s national data processing service, to explore the role of blockchain in secure public service delivery. As the world's largest state-owned IT company, SERPRO manages a staggering 33 billion transactions annually, highlighting the immense potential for Cardano's technology to enhance transparency and efficiency across Brazil's extensive government infrastructure, ultimately improving service delivery for millions of citizens.

Beyond direct project support, the Foundation actively engaged in broader ecosystem development and dialogue. At the BOB Konferenz in Berlin, Arnaud Bailly, Team Lead and Architect, presented “Against the (formal) method?” exploring the significance of formal methods in practical blockchain engineering. Furthering enterprise understanding and outreach, Global Business Development Lead Sandro Knöpfel hosted virtual roundtable discussions as part of the GDS "Meet the Boss" series, exploring the potential of blockchain to enhance authenticity and operational integrity across various sectors. Umar Jan, Senior Enterprise Enablement Manager, and Sebastian Bode, VP of Engineering, also joined Knöpfel at the GDS CIO Summit in the Netherlands, engaging in roundtable discussions and attending one-on-one meetings.

At the same time, community engagement remained a key priority, as highlighted by ongoing AMA sessions on X. These discussions provided a platform for open dialogue regarding roadmap progress, governance, and enterprise tools, reflecting the Foundation's commitment to transparency and direct communication with the Cardano community.

Supporting blockchain innovation and education

Recognizing education as a cornerstone of its mission, the Foundation actively equips diverse audiences, from newcomers and developers to regulators and decision-makers, with the resources needed to engage meaningfully with blockchain. The Foundation uses various channels, including events, research, learning platforms, and multimedia content, to cultivate informed participation within the rapidly evolving ecosystem. This comprehensive approach also enables the Foundation to expand access to Cardano-focused educational materials, tools, and thought leadership, empowering builders, enterprises, and learners to engage confidently.

Launched in March, Venture Hub by the Cardano Foundation represents a pilot program designed to refine the Foundation's support structure for emerging and established projects within the Cardano ecosystem. This initiative, building upon the Foundation’s existing technical guidance across numerous channels, offers curated assistance to increase the visibility of participating ventures. Participants will have opportunities to collaborate with internal teams and ecosystem experts, enabling the Foundation to gather valuable data and feedback to inform the program's future direction. Venture Hub aims to support the growth of high-potential projects exploring blockchain, existing Web 3.0 ventures, and new Web 3.0 innovators launching on Cardano.

Building on the Foundation's commitment to broad understanding, recent articles further illuminated core blockchain concepts. For instance, Advantages of Public Blockchains for Enterprises explored the potential of open, permissionless networks for businesses, detailing benefits such as enhanced traceability, data integrity, streamlined automation through smart contracts, and fostering trust in multi-party arrangements. Additionally, An Introduction to Proof of Stake Blockchain Systems demystifies this crucial consensus mechanism, explaining its role in validating transactions, reducing energy consumption compared to proof of work (PoW), and enhancing decentralization—a key feature of networks like Cardano.

The Let’s Talk Cardano podcast also continues to deliver valuable educational insights, featuring conversations with key voices in the blockchain industry. Looking ahead, the initiatives and collaborations undertaken in Q1 2025 lay a robust foundation for continued growth and adoption across the Cardano ecosystem. These efforts reinforce the network’s position as a leading public digital infrastructure capable of addressing real-world challenges and empowering a more transparent and resilient future.