Key entrepreneurs and investors say that the infrastructure is ready.
A space that was highly hyped in 2017 is witnessing a revival in 2024, with a bit more substance — and a new name — this time around.
The Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePIN) sector has more than doubled in the last six months from roughly $10 billion to roughly $25 billion, according to a dashboard from EV3, a firm focused exclusively on the vertical.
DePIN is, broadly speaking, a subsector of crypto which incentivizes the production of a resource, such as data storage (Filecoin, Arweave), mobile data (Helium), or computing power (Render, Akash).
Salvador Gala, the co-founder of EV3, told The Defiant that the dePIN space has quietly taken off in the two years since his firm’s founding. “When we first started, there were about 25 companies in the space. Today, we’re tracking almost 1,000,” he said.