Aethir's Decentralized GPU Cloud Milestones: Our 2024 Wrap-Up

We are at the very end of 2024, a key year for Aethir, filled with major milestones and product launches that propelled us to the top of the DePIN sector, pioneering decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming enterprises at scale. Aethir’s 2024 journey is a testament to the innovative potential of our DePIN value proposition. Aethir excels at decentralized GPU cloud computing solutions that can support the most demanding workloads in GPU-intensive industries, changing users' everyday lives worldwide. Our DePIN stack provides large-scale enterprise GPU computing services for the constantly evolving AI, Web3, and gaming industries' insatiable demand for GPU compute. Numerous industry leaders are already using Aethir’s GPU cloud for AI inference, AI agent training, and ambitious cloud gaming projects at scale.

We have prepared a detailed recap of Aethir’s 2024 journey, highlighting our key milestones and launches that made Aethir the global leader in decentralized enterprise-grade GPU cloud computing services.

Record-Breaking Web3 Node Sale: Aethir’s $100M Milestone

Aethir’s decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming is powered by 91,000+ community-owned Checker Nodes, responsible for ensuring the optimal quality of service in Aethir’s 360,000+ GPU-strong decentralized cloud. Checker Nodes constantly monitor all GPU Containers in our network and represent a critical element of Aethir’s decentralized GPU cloud computing infrastructure. All our Checker Nodes are community-owned and distributed among 22,000+ community members worldwide. For their role in securing the daily operations of Aethir’s GPU network, Checker Nodes earn ATH rewards, distributed based on node uptime and performance. Each quarter, all Checker Nodes with exceptional uptime and performance are rewarded with bonus ATH rewards. Apart from ATH rewards, one of the key Checker Node benefits is additional airdrop rewards from our AI and gaming ecosystem partners.

Aethir’s Checker Node sale in March 2024 was the largest and most successful node sale in Web3 history, with a remarkable $100 million worth of ETH in sold nodes. Our amazing Checker Node solution was the main driver behind the node sale. Still, it wouldn’t have been so successful without our network of over 80 esteemed partners who helped amplify and support Aethir’s Checker Node sale among their respective communities.

Empowering Web3 Communities with the Aethir Cloud Drop Airdrop Campaign

We launched Aethir Cloud Drop, our airdrop campaign for the upcoming ATH token in May. The campaign was unique among Web3 airdrops because we had an easy-to-use portal that made joining Aethir’s airdrop a straightforward, user-friendly process. Through the Aethir Cloud Drop portal, users could earn specific badges by fulfilling clear eligibility conditions and knowing they’ll receive an airdrop allocation of ATH if they’ve earned an airdrop badge. Furthermore, Checker Node holders and Aethir OGs had a special place in the airdrop campaign as our loyal community members. Aethir Cloud drop rewarded various active Web3 communities with a portion of our ATH token supply. It allowed the broader Web3 community to earn ATH by completing quests and earning additional badges.

We’ve allocated 6% of the 42 billion ATH token supply for our airdrop, which is divided into three seasons. In season 1 of Aethir Cloud Drop, we’ve distributed 630 million ATH to the community, fostering decentralization and community engagement as core pillars of the Web3 era. 

Revolutionizing DePIN with Aethir’s Mainnet and ATH Staking

On 12 June, Aethir’s mainnet was launched, along with our token generation event (TGE), marking the market debut of ATH, the fuel behind Aethir’s decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming. With Aethir’s mainnet launch, the Checker Node system came online, allowing node holders to earn ATH rewards by running their nodes by themselves or delegating them to one of our official Nodes-as-a-Service (NaaS) partners. Numerous top crypto exchanges announced the listing of ATH ahead of our TGE, with dozens of additional platforms listing ATH after the mainnet launch. Many of these exchanges organized ATH trading competitions and other activities to support the ATH token debut. 

Along with our TGE, we’ve also launched the ATH staking platform with two staking pools. Since Aethir’s ecosystem is divided into gaming and AI tracks, we’ve established the ATH-Gaming and ATH-AI staking pools, with significantly higher staking rewards than competitor projects. Our ATH token staking rewards have proven sustainable during the past 7 months. Staking is a key pillar of Aethir’s decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming. All GPU compute power in the Aethir network needs to be staked with ATH, hence the constant inflow of ATH tokens into our staking pools, as well as the sustainable ATH token staking rewards. By staking in our pools, community members can lock their ATH for up to nearly 4 years to maximize rewards while contributing to the stability of Aethir’s decentralized GPU cloud computing infrastructure. Furthermore, with our stATH liquid staking token, users can earn additional rewards on our ecosystem partners’ platforms, unlocking the added ATH token utility.

Aethir is pioneering sustainable staking in DePIN ecosystems, dependent directly on infrastructure growth, actual enterprise needs, and community engagement.

Aethir Edge: Decentralized Cloud Computing for Everyday Users

Aethir Edge embodies Aethir’s decentralized GPU cloud computing philosophy as a compact, user-friendly, consumer-grade cloud computing device. We’ve distributed over 47,000 Aethir Edge devices globally, powered by Qualcomm’s state-of-the-art chipsets, enabling Aethir Edge operators to provide premium cloud computing services to our AI and gaming clients worldwide. Aethir Edge devices support Aethir’s GPU cloud for AI inference and advanced gaming workloads while offering consumers easy access to Aethir’s DePIN stack as service providers. With Aethir Edge, device operators can earn daily ATH rewards by contributing computing power to Aethir’s GPU network and locally processing computing tasks as physically close as possible to our end clients. Aethir Edge devices are counted as GPU Containers in Aethir’s decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming,  just like regular GPUs, and they are available to support our clients with computing power at all times. Our cloud computing devices can efficiently provide GPU compute for AI workloads and gaming enterprises at scale.

Aethir Edge has a special role in the Aethir ecosystem because it efficiently powers multiple innovative work tracks, including cloud phones and next-generation social media infrastructure. APhone is one of Aethir’s key partners, pioneering the first decentralized cloud phone on the market. It leverages Aethir Edge to handle data and support localized workload processing. Similarly, Aethir Edge will enhance the performance of social media management applications as part of one of Aethir’s new, exciting product lines focused on AI-powered social media services. 

Aethir’s $80M Revenue in 2024 – Leading the DePIN Sector

July saw the unveiling of Aethir’s core business and annual revenue, which showed that Aethir is truly the leader of the DePIN sector with $40 million worth of annual recurring revenue. In true Web3 fashion, Aethir committed to bringing that fiat revenue on-chain through ATH tokens. The lack of actual revenue is a common issue for many DePIN projects. Aethir’s $40 million revenue is even more impressive since it’s more than all of our competitors' annual revenue combined. Aethir’s substantial revenue results from our tireless efforts to onboard AI and gaming innovators as our clients and provide them with premium GPU computing services that support their daily operations in a reliable and scalable way. Aethir’s DePIN stack proved to be a trustworthy GPU cloud for AI inference and advanced Web3 cloud gaming solutions. Just six months after our initial annual revenue announcement, in December, we managed to double our revenue to more than $80 million according to DePIN Ninja. 

At the same time as our revenue reveal, we’ve also unveiled Aethir’s core business model, which is focused on providing GPU compute for AI workloads and gaming companies. In the gaming sector, Aethir is geared toward innovative gaming studios and well-developed Web3 cloud gaming solutions that need reliable GPU computing supplies. In the AI industry, Aethir’s infrastructure is specifically designed to support advanced AI inference, large language model (LLM) training, and innovations in decentralized AI agents.

Aethir’s GPU decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming enterprises can be divided into Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), which provides clients with virtualized GPU instances and allows them to scale their computing resources up or down, and Platform as a Service (PaaS), which includes a comprehensive suite of tools and services for developing, testing, and deploying GPU-accelerated applications. Additionally, our Bare Metal GPU offering is best suited for clients who require maximum control and performance, utilizing our state-of-the-art GPUs, such as NVIDIA H100s, for AI inference.

Supporting Web3 Decentralization: Aethir’s $50M Community Rewards

Aethir’s DePIN stack is a community-driven decentralized cloud. As a sign of our appreciation and dedication to our loyal community, we’ve announced a special $50 million Community Bonus Rewards Program (CBRP) in July. As part of the program, we’ve distributed $30 million worth of ATH as additional staking rewards for the ATH-AI staking pool for 24 weeks, along with an instant distribution of $20 million worth of ATH to our community. Through this program, we reaffirmed Aethir’s commitment to our community and the acceleration of the Aethir ecosystem’s growth and development.

Simplified Access to Aethir’s Decentralized Cloud Ecosystem: Aethir User Portal

As part of Aethir’s dedication to improving every aspect of the overall user experience across our various products, we launched the Aethir User Portal in July, marking a significant milestone for our community. The User Portal is a one-stop-shop for the Aethir ecosystem, allowing our users to access staking, Checker Node management, Aethir Edge device management, and EcoDrop rewards from our partners, all through a single interface. Furthermore, users can bridge and swap their ATH tokens directly on the User Portal, thanks to our integration with Axelar’s blockchain bridge, and they can view real-time stats regarding the ATH token’s price performance. Aethir’s community-driven decentralized cloud ecosystem is easy to navigate thanks to our straightforward and practical User Portal.

New Horizons: Onboarding New Cohorts of Aethir Cloud Hosts

The Aethir decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming has been rapidly expanding in 2024, with dozens of partners joining our ecosystem, looking to leverage our GPU infrastructure for their exciting projects. To accommodate the exponential growth of our clients’ GPU demand, we have announced the New Horizons program to onboard new cohorts of Cloud Hosts. Our network of Cloud Host GPU providers is constantly growing, in line with the growing demand for GPU compute for AI workloads like AI inference, AI agents, and cloud gaming. 

Aethir is always focused on the future, so we’ve opened Cloud Host applications to enterprises and individual GPU providers to ensure our GPU network is always capable of handling the growing needs of our clients. Cloud Hosts are vital for powering our cost-effective GPU solutions for AI models and our state-of-the-art Web3 cloud gaming solutions. Like Checker Nodes, Aethir Edge devices, and stakers, Cloud Hosts also earn ATH token rewards for providing premium cloud computing services in Aethir’s network.

Aethir’s $100 Million Ecosystem Fund for AI and Gaming Innovators

To jumpstart the next evolutionary phase of AI and gaming innovation, Aethir has launched a $100M Ecosystem Fund for AI and gaming to stimulate ecosystem growth. This fund is reserved for groundbreaking innovators developing and launching AI and gaming companies that provide never-before-seen utility and user experiences. Eligible AI and gaming enterprises can receive Aethir compute grants, subsidies, and token grants from our Ecosystem Fund. The fund is divided into several grant programs, including Aethir Catalyst and two ecosystem grant programs with XAI and XPLA, worth $10 million each. These grant programs are especially geared toward combining blockchain infrastructure, Aethir’s GPU cloud for AI inference, and advanced Web3 gaming workloads. Furthermore, The Blockchain Center Abu Dhabi (ADBC) joined Aethir’s Ecosystem Fund as an exclusive regional partner for the MENA region. 

The Aethir Ecosystem Fund for AI and gaming is designed to support the most promising projects in the Web3 industry, and it’s primarily focused on innovations in decentralized AI agents as the most groundbreaking sector in the industry. Aethir has already onboarded three batches of AI agents into our ecosystem through compute grants. For more details on our AI agent grantees, check our blogs for batches 1, 2, and 3, and stay tuned for our next batch of innovative AI agent partnerships.

Applying for Aethir Ecosystem Fund grants is relatively straightforward, and builders can apply by filling out this form. If your AI or gaming enterprise is eligible for a grant, feel free to apply, and our team members will get back to you as soon as possible. 

Aethir’s Decentralized Governance Model

In November, Aethir announced plans to implement a decentralized governance model that aligns with our commitment to empower the Aethir community with decision-making capabilities.  Through this transition, Aethir aims to give our stakeholders more influence over the development direction of Aethir’s decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming, ensuring a more democratic and resilient ecosystem. Checker Node holders, ATH stakers, and Cloud Hosts are key pillars of the Aethir DePIN stack, and they deserve to have a say in Aethir’s Web3 journey. That’s why we are introducing a genuinely decentralized governance model in the spirit of Web3. 

The process will have several implementation and beta testing stages to ensure the final governance model best suits the Aethir community. The implementation of the governance model is scheduled for 2025. 

Representing Decentralized GPU Cloud Innovation at Key Web3 Events

Web3 conferences are of key importance for networking and establishing new contacts among industry leaders, innovators, and rising stars. Furthermore, events, presentations, and panel discussions are great for introducing new products and services to expert audiences. Aethir’s team was extremely busy throughout the year and attended numerous high-profile AI, gaming, blockchain, and Web3 conferences to spread Aethir’s vision of cost-effective GPU solutions for AI models and Web3 cloud gaming solutions. Aethir’s two co-founders, our CEO, Dan Wang, and our CSO, Mark Rydon, attended dozens of events, keynotes, and panel discussions worldwide, supported by Aethir’s team members from various departments who also had the opportunity to represent Aethir at numerous events.

We’ve hosted and co-hosted over 50 highly successful events, and our team members have attended even more panels and networking events in 2024. Additionally, we’ve hosted numerous VIP dinners and several conference afterparties to mark the successful closure of major conference weeks. 

These are the key conferences at which Aethir was present throughout 2024: EthCC, TOKEN2049 Dubai, Gamescom, Korea Blockchain Week, TOKEN2049 Singapore, Devcon Southeast Asia. 

We finished the year with a rollercoaster of international events in December, including India Blockchain Week, Taipei Blockchain Week, AI Summit Seoul, Abu Dhabi Finance Week, Emergence Prague, and GamesBeat Insider Series. 

Top Ecosystem Partnerships Driving Aethir’s Growth in 2024

The Aethir ecosystem is one of the largest and most vibrant networks of premium enterprises leveraging decentralized infrastructure for AI and gaming. We’ve built a massive ecosystem of over 80 partners from the AI, gaming, AI agents, enterprise, Web3 infrastructure, metaverse, and NFT sectors. 

Our partners are leveraging Aethir’s DePIN stack in their daily operations to improve various aspects of their products and services with Aethir’s decentralized GPU cloud for AI inference and gaming. Aethir’s globally distributed GPU cloud is a cloud computing powerhouse capable of supporting all types of GPU-intensive applications and workloads at scale. This is one of the key reasons why dozens of reputable enterprises chose Aethir as their dedicated GPU cloud for AI inference and gaming workloads in 2024. To make it simple for anyone to browse Aethir’s ecosystem and explore our global partnership network, we’ve launched the Aethir Ecosystem Explorer.

Let’s look at some of our most prominent partnerships in 2024.

In the gaming sector, we partnered with industry-leading gaming studios, pioneering innovative Web3 cloud gaming solutions and with enterprises specialized in bringing Web2 games into the Web3 era. We joined forces with XPLA, GameCentric, Xai, Unite, Return Entertainment, Grampus, Beamable, GameSwift, SuperScale, Xsolla, MetaGravity, Sequence, and Magic Eden.

With our partners from MetaStreet, we’ve launched the NodeFi platform and the Tactical Compute initiative. We've also joined MetaStreet’s Yield Pass to provide exciting new benefits for Aethir Checker Node holders.

On the AI front, TensorOpera, a global leader in LLM training and AI inference, joined Aethir’s ecosystem, along with additional prominent AI enterprises, including Mira and NEAR Foundation. Furthermore, Injective, and OpenLedger will also use Aethir’s decentralized cloud for GPU compute resources.

Manta Network and Filecoin Foundation will leverage Aethir’s DePIN stack to provide premium cloud computing resources to builders in their respective ecosystems. At the same time, Axelar, Auros, and LayerZero will support blockchain conversions and token transactions of our ATH token, while in 2025, Aethir plans to migrate its infrastructure to the Sophon blockchain.

Furthermore, we’ve partnered with Impossible Cloud Network to broaden the reach of our cloud computing infrastructure, while our partnership with GAIB and GMI Cloud will introduce the first deployment of NVIDIA H200s for decentralized AI computing. 

Also, in May, we introduced Aethir EcoDrop, an exciting initiative in which our selected ecosystem partners have been announcing exclusive rewards for the Aethir community in the form of airdrops and staking rewards. In June, July, August, October, November, and December, 30 additional partners announced surprises for Aethir Checker Node holders and ATH stakers.

This is just a glimpse of our partner network, showcasing the most prominent examples of industry-shaping partnerships within the Aethir ecosystem.

Expanding Community Knowledge on Decentralized GPU Cloud Computing Infrastructure

Knowledge is the key to understanding decentralized GPU cloud computing infrastructure's impact and innovative potential for numerous industries, including Web3, AI, and gaming. Throughout 2024, Aethir has been dedicated to educating the community on key industry topics related to decentralized cloud benefits for AI enterprises and Aethir’s Web3 cloud gaming solutions. We have made Aethir’s blog a true knowledge hub on decentralized cloud computing and its relation to AI and gaming innovation.

Let’s look at some of the key topics we covered in our blog section in 2024.

Our community had the opportunity to learn about GPU-specific topics like GPU collocations vs decentralization, Aethir’s enterprise AI capabilities, the benefits of bare metal GPU hardware, the business case for renting GPUs, and how to choose the right GPU for your AI workload. These topics covered key AI and GPU-related areas, including cost-effective GPU solutions for AI models and decentralized cloud benefits for AI enterprises.

In the AI segment, we’ve expanded our community’s knowledge on essential industry topics, such as Aethir’s role in the acceleration of AI development and how we are fueling AI’s future with DePIN solutions. We also dived into the integration possibilities of AI and blockchain technology, as well as the ethical implications of decentralized AI.

Aethir’s Ecosystem Fund for AI and gaming is strongly supporting innovations in decentralized AI agents development, which is why we did our best to educate the community on the perspective of AI agents for various use cases. Our AI agent blogs explored how AI agents are revolutionizing gaming, and the role of decentralized GPU cloud computing in building smarter autonomous agents. We also explored next-gen AI agent innovation and how Aethir’s Ecosystem Fund is playing a pivotal role in supporting AI agent evolution. 

On the gaming side, we dived into the innovative potential of decentralized cloud gaming and explored how Aethir’s DePIN stack is bringing Web2 games into the Web3 era, while breaking the hold of app stores by leveraging our InstaPlay Web3 cloud gaming solutions. Our blog covered a plethora of topics focused on the benefits of decentralized cloud gaming for Web3 studios at scale. Also, we’ve educated our community on the critical role of GPUs in cloud gaming, and the potential of generative AI in game development. 

Aethir’s Vision for 2025: Scaling Decentralized GPU Computing

This year has been the most important one so far for Aethir because of our tremendously successful mass-market debut and the launch of our key products and services. We are finishing 2024 as the leading DePIN ecosystem for decentralized GPU cloud computing, with a network of over 80 partners and clients from various sectors of the Web3, AI, blockchain, and gaming industries, along with the highest annual revenue among all DePIN enterprises on the market. We couldn’t accomplish this without our community and partners' help. Aethir’s GPU infrastructure is community-owned and powered, which is a testament to our dedication to a decentralized Web3 future.  

It won’t be easy to surpass this year’s accomplishments in 2025, but that’s precisely what we plan to do with numerous surprises, including new product launches and significant utility enhancements for our existing ecosystem services and features. 

2025, here we come!