DePIN Day Denver returned to ETH Denver for its 10th global edition and brought together leaders shaping the future of decentralized infrastructure. In this powerhouse panel moderated by Adam Wozney (Akash Network), four pioneers of the DePIN movement explored real-world progress and the technical, economic, and trust-layer challenges standing in the way of global adoption.
Speakers:
- Bernhard Borges (Fluence) – innovations in decentralized cloud and compute
- Mike Horton (Geodnet) – building the world’s largest geospatial network
- Kai Wawrzinek (Impossible Cloud / ICN) – enterprise adoption and AI infrastructure
- Charles Cao (Swan Chain) – compute, storage, and token-based coordination
The DePIN Moment Is Here
The panelists unanimously agreed: DePIN has moved beyond the experimentation phase. While the first generation of networks focused on building infrastructure, the new wave is scaling real-world usage and revenue. From AI inference to decentralized positioning networks, Web3-native infrastructure is gaining serious traction and catching the eye of traditional enterprises.
“DePIN is the trillion-dollar opportunity for Web3,” said Bernhard Borges. “It’s the first time real-world infrastructure is being built in a more secure, permissionless and resilient way.”
Supply Was Easy. Demand Is Hard.
A major theme was the shift in focus from supply-side growth to demand-side adoption. While many DePIN projects have succeeded in attracting contributors and hardware, converting that capacity into enterprise-ready solutions remains a key challenge.
Kai Wawrzinek pointed out that compliance, performance, security and UX are must-haves for attracting real business use cases: “If a protocol expects enterprises to use a wallet and deal with tokenomics, they won’t onboard. We need to abstract away the Web3 complexity.”
Real Infrastructure, Real Revenue
Mike Horton shared how Geodnet has grown into the largest precision geospatial network by deploying globally distributed GPS base stations. Charles Cao emphasized how decentralized compute networks are now being used for AI model deployment and inference at lower cost and with broader reach than hyperscalers allow.
Several panelists emphasized that DePIN’s value proposition is about economics. With some networks reaching millions in annual revenue and new use cases emerging in AI, edge computing, and data storage, DePIN is increasingly seen as the next major evolution in cloud infrastructure.
From Price to Performance
Security and trust remain top-of-mind. Bernard noted that hardware innovations like Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs) enable better confidentiality and performance than traditional solutions. Meanwhile, decentralized design means no single point of failure and greater resilience for mission-critical workloads.
Geofencing, compliance, and data sovereignty were also key themes. As more enterprises seek fine-grained control over where and how their data is stored and processed, DePIN networks offer an alternative to rigid cloud provider policies.
Looking Ahead: Billion-Dollar Use Cases
Looking ahead, the panelists predicted the emergence of billion-dollar revenue streams within DePIN. They see increasing enterprise partnerships, large-scale AI deployments, and real applications running on decentralized infrastructure as key milestones for the year ahead.
“In 12 months, we won’t just be talking about millions in revenue,” said Kai. “We’ll be seeing billion-dollar DePIN applications that rival or replace traditional cloud providers.”
With momentum building across compute, data, and storage layers, DePIN is no longer a niche experiment — it’s becoming the new backbone of the internet.
