Every chain has limits. Ethereum, for all its strength, was never built to run heavy computation inside every block. Gas is scarce, loops are costly, and ambitious logic usually gets pushed off-chain into systems that are opaque and hard to verify. Boundless approaches this problem differently. Its Steel coprocessor gives Ethereum more room to breathe, acting as a zk-powered extension that runs complex jobs externally while keeping the verification lightweight on-chain.
Why Ethereum Needed a Release Valve
Smart contracts can’t handle endless computation. Even simple math-heavy logic competes with transfers and dApp activity. That forces developers to design conservatively, leaving advanced use cases AI logic, portfolio simulations, or zero-knowledge checks outside Ethereum’s core.
Steel addresses this by shifting the heavy lifting to a zkVM-powered coprocessor. Computation runs externally, proofs are generated, and Ethereum only verifies the result. That means developers can scale their ideas without sacrificing Ethereum’s efficiency or trust guarantees.
How the Coprocessor Model Works
Steel isn’t a separate blockchain it’s a proving layer tied into Boundless’s architecture. Developers write code in familiar languages, the zkVM executes it, and recursive proofs compress the result. A predeployed verifier contract on Ethereum checks the proof in near-constant time.
From Ethereum’s perspective, nothing changes it simply receives a verified receipt. But behind that receipt lies an entire network of provers, brokers, and recursive logic that ensure the result is correct and decentralized.
What This Unlocks for Builders
The applications of Steel are already clear:
Privacy-first identity contracts can run set membership checks or zk logic externally, sending back only compact proofs.
DeFi innovation credit scoring, collateral models, or risk simulations can operate at complexity levels Solidity alone can’t handle.
Machine learning even inference jobs, like large matrix operations, can be proven correct and integrated into dApps without breaking composability.
The power here isn’t just in one use case. It’s that Steel works as a shared zk infrastructure usable across rollups and chains so developers don’t have to reinvent proving systems from scratch.
Boundless Vision and Modular Design
Boundless has always aimed to modularize blockchain workloads. Just as data availability has moved off-chain and execution has scaled with rollups, verifiable computation now finds its modular home through Steel.
It doesn’t require forks, rewrites, or fragile sidechains. Ethereum stays simple and secure, while Boundless handles the heavy jobs off-chain and proves them back with cryptographic certainty. This reinforces a bigger idea: not everything needs to live on the base chain. It just needs to be verifiable.
Risks and How They’re Managed
Of course, this model brings new responsibilities:
Prover honesty Steel’s jobs must be completed fairly. Boundless uses its Broker layer and Proof of Verifiable Work to back computation with economic guarantees.
Hardware centralization zk proving can be resource-intensive. Boundless tackles this by incentivizing broader participation and rewarding measurable compute, not reputation.
Verification cost even minimized proofs need to be checked on-chain. Recursive design and modular upgrades ensure these costs stay sustainable as hardware improves.
Steel is not a one-time feature but an evolving system, with performance gains and new zk optimizations always in scope.
Doing Less to Achieve More
The real elegance of Steel is in what it doesn’t try to do. It doesn’t overload Ethereum. It doesn’t replace it. Instead, it acknowledges Ethereum’s limits and extends them safely. By separating compute from verification, it creates space for applications once thought impossible on-chain.
Boundless calls this “scaling through proofs.” And if Ethereum is the reliable watch, Steel is the silent engine beside it unseen, but powering new possibilities without disturbing the original design.