Understanding the Technical Highlights and Layout of the Space and Time Project in One Article

In August 2024, Space and Time announced the closing of a new $20 million Series A funding round led by Framework Ventures, with participation from M12, Microsoft's venture capital arm. It is worth mentioning that this is not the first time Microsoft has invested in the project. Back in September 2022, M12 led a round of investment of the same amount – Microsoft's largest investment in the convergence of blockchain and AI to date. To date, Space and Time has raised $50 million.

So, what exactly attracted Microsoft's attention to Space and Time? What underlying technologies has it won capital favor with? This article will systematically dissect the project's technical architecture and ecological potential.

What is Space and Time?

Space and Time (SXT) expands zero-knowledge proofs on decentralized databases, providing trustless data processing capabilities for smart contracts. SXT can be used to connect our comprehensive blockchain data indexed from mainstream Blockchains with your application data or other off-chain datasets.

One of its core components is the SQL Proof, which is a sub-second zero-knowledge proof co-processor that allows smart contracts to initiate complex queries on-chain or across other chains, and return ZK-verified computation results in the next block. This enables developers to build more complex and dynamic decentralized applications based on on-chain transactions, events, storage, and other data.

What are the underlying technical advantages of Space and Time?

Decentralized Database System

Space and Time brings the query capabilities of traditional databases to Web3 by combining Proof of SQL with ZK Proofs to achieve on-chain verifiable data query results.

Proof of SQL: Ensure the verifiability of every database query result to avoid cheating by centralized nodes.

ZK Proofs: While ensuring data privacy, they guarantee the trustworthiness of computations, making them suitable for high-sensitivity scenarios such as finance and AI. ZK Proofs play a key role in the verifiability of data and zero-trust architecture, high performance and sub-second proof generation, data privacy protection, trustworthy bridging of on-chain and off-chain data integration, decentralization, and tamper resistance.

The ease of use and compatibility of SQL

SQL is a mainstream database development language, and its declarative syntax structure allows users to describe the desired results without needing to write out the complete operation process. It has a high degree of standardization and a low threshold:

Lower the development threshold to attract Web2 developers to migrate to Web3.

Reusable traditional application logic accelerates the dApp development cycle.

Application of Zero-Knowledge Co-Processor

A coprocessor refers to an auxiliary computing unit that can offload the main chain's computational load, enhancing performance and efficiency. In the blockchain field, it is typically used to improve computational efficiency, support specific functions, enable parallel processing, reduce energy consumption, and enhance security. Examples include Bitcoin's ASIC mining chips, ZKP generation and verification, and Layer 2 state updates, all of which are typical applications of coprocessors.

The ZK co-processor of Space and Time offloads SQL query computation tasks from the main blockchain (such as Ethereum) to off-chain execution, significantly reducing on-chain computation costs (such as Gas fees) and latency.

For example, for SQL queries that process millions of rows of data, the ZK coprocessor can generate zero-knowledge proofs at the sub-second level, eliminating the need for on-chain double computation. The coprocessor not only executes SQL queries, but also generates small, low-cost proofs of ZK-SNARKs for real-time transactions.

By migrating data processing and proof generation off-chain, the ZK co-processor addresses the bottleneck of smart contracts accessing historical or cross-chain data, significantly enhancing the scalability of the Blockchain. For example, it supports indexing data from major chains like Ethereum, Polygon, and ZKsync, breaking down data silos on-chain.

The ZK co-processor also supports integration with off-chain databases (such as PostgreSQL, Snowflake), enabling smart contracts to perform complex cross-chain queries or hybrid queries, with all results returned on-chain through ZK proofs, ensuring trustworthiness without the need for trust.

Space and Time has specifically optimized the ZK co-processor for SQL, achieving proof generation speeds that are 1-2 orders of magnitude faster compared to general zkVM. Recent posts on platform X claim that the performance of the Proof of SQL co-processor has improved by 3 times, effectively reducing query latency and further enhancing its real-time trading capabilities.

What are the differences between Space and Time and its competitors?

Currently, most blockchain data query protocols, such as The Graph, use subgraph mechanisms to index on-chain data. The characteristics of these protocols are:

• Easy to use, developers can get started quickly.
• But it relies on the honesty of the indexers and lacks a built-in verifiable computation mechanism.
• More suitable for lightweight, on-chain data-centric dApps, such as NFTs or DAOs.

Space and Time provides stronger data verifiability and supports on-chain and off-chain data integration. In comparison:

• Performance: Supports PB-level data sub-second queries, efficiency far exceeds traditional solutions.
• Cost: The operating cost is only 20% of similar solutions.
• Application: Suitable for complex data interaction, enterprise-level analysis, AI training data invocation, and other needs.

Of course, the threshold is also higher, posing challenges to developers' understanding of ZK and data architecture design capabilities.

Future Outlook and Potential Risks

The positioning of Space and Time determines that it develops in a misaligned manner with mainstream query protocols in application scenarios, and the competitive relationship is not direct. However, the project is still in its early stages, and the ecosystem has not yet been fully established.

• The community is small and has not yet formed a strong developer network.
• The commercial implementation is still in the exploratory phase, with few use cases.

However, its technological potential and the endorsement from institutions like Microsoft make it a potential dark horse in the "AI + Blockchain" track.

Summary

Space and Time, as an emerging project, has accumulated financing of 50 million USD, making it one of the more representative phenomenon-level projects in the current "Blockchain + AI" sector. It has strong technological innovation, but it may face challenges in the future, such as insufficient use cases and low user activity. Therefore, participation should still be carefully evaluated based on personal judgment.

This round of financing is also Microsoft's first major investment in the combination of Blockchain and AI. As a traditional tech giant, Microsoft is promoting its Azure cloud services to further adapt to the integration trend of Web3 and AI through this layout. At the same time, the participation of institutions also endorses the project, enhancing confidence in this direction both within and outside the industry.

It can be said that Microsoft’s investment this time demonstrates its long-term optimism towards the intersection of Blockchain and AI, and its logic continues the approach taken with the investment in OpenAI. To some extent, this conveys a signal that traditional technology companies are moving from "watching" to "deep participation," further driving market interest in the integration projects of "AI + Blockchain."