The Index Podcast

What happens when traditional finance collides with decentralized networks? Hadley Stern, Chief Commercial Officer at Marinade Finance, takes us on a fascinating journey from his 18-year career at Fidelity Investments to the cutting edge of decentralized finance. Drawing from his pioneering experience leading Bitcoin initiatives as early as 2014, Hadley provides unique insights into why decentralized networks represent the fut...

What if blockchain networks could process transactions hundreds of times faster than they do today? This fundamental question led Austin Federa to leave his position at the Solana Foundation and co-found Double Zero, a revolutionary project building what might be the future of the internet itself.

Austin reveals the surprising limitations of our current internet infrastructure that most people never consider. While enginee...

What happens when one of crypto’s most prestigious investment firms decides to go all-in on Solana?

In this episode of The Index Podcast, host Alex Kehaya sits down with Cosmo Jiang, General Partner at Pantera Capital, to unpack their groundbreaking move into the Digital Asset Treasury (DAT) space with HSDT Helios—a $500 million Solana-focused venture already making waves across the industry.

Why Solana over other blockchains? Cosmo ...

What does the future of Ethereum and blockchain really look like — a few massive chains, or thousands of specialized ones working together? This week, host Alex Kehaya sits down with Sam McIngvale, Head of Product at OP Labs, to explore the evolution of Optimism from an Ethereum scaling solution into the creator of an entire ecosystem powered by the OP Stack.

Sam breaks down the idea of the “Superchain” and many others share both te...

The blockchain world is undergoing a fundamental shift. What once seemed possible—scaling Web3 to internet size with a single chain—is now recognized as unrealistic. The future belongs to specialized chains that excel at specific tasks while seamlessly communicating with one another.

This week on The Index, host Alex Kehaya sits down with Mark Boiron, CEO of Polygon Labs, to discuss the next chapter in open source development and ex...

What happens when a computer science PhD specializing in AI pivots to blockchain technology? For Radha Dasari, Lead Technical Advocate at the Web3 Foundation, it was a journey fueled by a mission to combat digital misinformation and bring fairness to the internet.

In this eye-opening episode of The Index, host Alex Kehaya sits down with Radha to explore how Polkadot has evolved since its early days of parachain auctions. H...

What happens when you combine addictive gameplay with blockchain technology? According to Rick Johanson and Dan Peng, Founding Partners at Arbitrum Gaming Ventures, the answer isn't simply "add a token and hope for the best." Their refreshing approach prioritizes the core gameplay experience first, with blockchain features thoughtfully layered in only when they truly enhance the player experience.

The gaming...

What happens when we can no longer trust the performance claims of AI model creators?

That’s the challenge driving LayerLens, an innovative platform bringing transparency and practical evaluation to the rapidly evolving AI landscape.

In this episode, host Alex Kehaya sits down with Archie Chaudhury, Co-founder of LayerLens, to explore how blockchain-powered benchmarking can cut through the hype and deliver verifiable, real-world AI p...

What if staking could be seamless, secure and DeFi-friendly? In this episode of The Index, host Alex Kehaya talks with Michael Repetny, Co-founder and CEO of Marinade Finance, the largest staking protocol on Solana with over $1.5 billion in crypto assets under management.

Michael shares the remarkable journey behind Marinade—from a scrappy Solana hackathon project to a cornerstone of Solana’s infrastructure. Built by a team that tur...

What’s stopping DeFi from going mainstream—and how can better UX, infrastructure, and automation unlock its full potential? In this episode of The Index, host Alex Kehaya talks with Vikram Arun, Co-founder of Superform, about building the future of on-chain wealth management. After managing a $100B DeFi book at BlockTower, Vikram saw a clear problem: if even institutional investors struggled with yield strategies, how could everyda...

How do you build a DePIN network with 2.7M+ devices, zero CAC, and data streams optimized for AI—without draining batteries or compromising user trust?

In this episode of The Index, Alex Kehaya sits down with Jesse Adams, serial entrepreneur and co-founder of Uprock, to unpack how they’re building the world’s first mobile-first DePIN for AI.

Jesse’s journey spans building an adult app store, launching an encrypted browser (Tenta, acq...

Ever wondered what happens to those domain names gathering digital dust in your GoDaddy account? In this episode of The Index, host Alex Kehaya sits down with Michael Ho, Co-founder of D3, to explore how blockchain technology is transforming the overlooked world of domain trading and ownership.

The domain industry hasn’t changed much since the ’90s. Selling a valuable name still involves clunky escrow services, manual transfers, and...

What if you could rebuild telecom from the ground up—open, decentralized, and powered by crypto? In this episode of The Index, host Alex Kehaya chats with Frank Mong, COO of Nova Labs, the team behind Helium Mobile—the decentralized wireless network now partnering with AT&T and Telefónica.

Helium started with a bold idea: replace legacy cell towers with a community-powered network. The key unlock? Blockchain incentives. After ye...

What if you could bring Solana’s speed to every major blockchain—and onboard millions of new users with zero friction?

In this new episode of The Index, host Alex Kehaya welcomes back Joanna Zeng, Co-founder & CEO of SOON, for an exciting update on how her team is breaking down the walls between blockchain ecosystems and building the infrastructure for a more unified Web3.

Soon is pioneering a decoupled SVM architecture—separatin...

The future of AI needs a new internet. Coinbase is laying the foundation.
 In this episode of The Index, host Alex Kehaya talks with Nemil Dalal, Head of Coinbase’s Developer Platform, about how Coinbase is building crypto-native infrastructure to power the next generation of applications, starting with autonomous AI agents.

Nemil shares his background in crypto, from meeting Brian Armstrong at Y Combinator to helping scale USDC...

What if launching a decentralized network didn’t require reinventing tokenomics or compromising on trust and security?

This week on The Index, host Alex Kehaya sits down with Misha Putiatin, Co-founder of Symbiotic, to explore how their novel approach to universal staking is changing the game for protocol builders. Instead of issuing a new token to bootstrap security, Symbiotic enables networks to leverage existing assets like ETH, ...

What does it take to make DeFi yield simple, transparent, and unstoppable?

In this episode of The Index, we sit down with Sunand Raghupathi, Co-founder and CEO of VEDA, to explore his journey from leaving a computer science PhD program to building one of DeFi’s fastest-growing platforms. VEDA has grown to $2 billion in assets and 100,000+ users in just over a year, proving there’s massive demand for easy, accessible crypto yield.

Wha...

What if blockchains could communicate as easily as APIs? In The Index's Everything SVM episode, Alex Kehaya and Omar Zaki sit down with Dean Little, Co-founder and Chief Scientist at Zeus Network, which is building a seamless way to connect Bitcoin and other major blockchains to the Solana ecosystem. His other work includes cryptography research at Jupiter Research Center, where he focuses on advancing secure blockchain system...

What if the world’s most powerful AI wasn’t controlled by a handful of tech giants, but was open, accessible, and owned by everyone?

In this episode of The Index, we sit down with Vincent Weisser, Co-founder and CEO of Prime Intellect, to explore his groundbreaking vision for democratizing artificial intelligence. Vincent pulls back the curtain on the technical and philosophical innovations behind Prime Intellect, from distributed t...