According to an official announcement by Starkware, blockchain API and node service provider Alchemy has integrated its Ethereum layer-two (L2) solution Starknet. This means developers can now leverage Alchemy's infrastructure tools alongside Starknet's zero-knowledge (ZK) rollup technology, significantly reducing development barriers and costs.
100x Gas Fee Advantage: A Technological Breakthrough for ZK Rollups
Starkware revealed the collaboration on Twitter, emphasizing that Alchemy's suite of products will “make it easier and more accessible for the growing number of developers to build on Starknet.” Starknet's rollups use ZK-based computations with validity proofs to bundle transactions off-chain and verify them on-chain, claiming gas fees are 100x lower than Ethereum layer one (L1). In contrast to other L2 scaling solutions such as optimistic rollups, which can take longer to confirm transactions, Starknet's validity rollups use validity proofs to instantly prove transaction validity.
Alchemy stated in its press release: “We're excited about supporting Starknet because we believe that Starknet's utilization of validity and ZK-rollups offer solutions to core Web3 problems. These solutions increase scalability by bundling transactions together off-chain, and then verifying them on-chain with just a fraction of the costs.”
Valued at $2 Billion: Starkware's Capital Journey
The Alchemy integration follows Starkware's announcement of Starknet Alpha mainnet deployment at the end of February 2022. In November 2021, Starkware raised $50 million in a Series C led by Sequoia Capital, bringing total funding to $173 million and propelling the Israel-based startup's valuation to $2 billion. Eli Ben-Sasson, co-inventor of Starknet and co-founder and president of Starkware, remarked: “It means that with Alchemy's infrastructure, the developer community now can more easily access Starknet, the most cutting edge permissionless scaling platform, harnessing the power of validity proofs.”
Industry Impact: L2 Scaling Enters a New Phase
Alchemy, which provides API call data for networks like Ethereum, Polygon, Arbitrum, Optimism, and Flow, further strengthens its position as a Web3 infrastructure layer. Analysts believe that ZK rollup technology, with its extremely low gas fees and instant transaction finality, is poised to become the dominant scaling solution for Ethereum. Starknet's adoption will provide superior infrastructure for high-frequency applications such as DeFi perpetuals and derivatives protocols, accelerating the Web3 ecosystem toward mass-scale adoption.