Intersect facilitates the continued growth and continuity of a decentralized and inclusive self-sustaining Cardano by providing additional governance processes and structures that enable the Cardano community to advance the protocol together. This includes maintenance, development, testing, fundraising, infrastructure, and support initiatives—all initiated and driven by committees and working groups. As a community-governed blockchain, this means caring about the technology and processes, enabling technical progress and consensus through discourse and collaboration.

Cardano has an underlying operational cost for keeping the network running each year. This includes maintenance, upgrades, and a variety of technical innovations to ensure Cardano continues to be a current and leading blockchain. Initially, for 2024, members of Input Output Global and EMURGO funded Cardano’s continuity. This funding enables a collection of members to continue supplying technical services to deliver the core operations.

What does Cardano continuity mean?

Cardano “continuity” is defined or referred to as any approved & required technical services needed to build or fix current and future areas of the Cardano blockchain. Continuity in this definition can include new development, such as the CIP-1694 governance software, components upgrades, or testing improvements, to name a few.

Continuity ultimately describes requirements and technical services that support the Cardano network daily, ensuring the chain is fit-for-purpose and forward-looking. Looking towards the 2025 Cardano budget, Intersect members will define continuity work through community processes and—with on-chain community consent—funded by the Cardano treasury. Intersect will continue to facilitate and administrate the technical delivery of continuity as it does today.

Delivery assurance function

Delivery assurance refers to the commitment & processes between continuity delivery partners to ensure the timely and reliable delivery of products, services, or projects - meeting specified requirements and expectations. It involves managing risks, monitoring progress, and implementing strategies for successful & punctual delivery. The methodology to gain assurance is flexible, depending on the length, complexity, and associated delivery risks.

Steered by the Technical Steering Committee (TSC), the Delivery Assurance team is a core function at Intersect - completing tasks outlined above on behalf of the community. The team must execute its functions to ensure Cardano's continuity plan is delivered.

Intersect Cardano Continuity Quarterly Plan

Intersect’s Delivery Assurance and Technical Operations teams have been preparing a first-of-its-kind Cardano Continuity Quarterly Plan. Drawing on seed funding from IOG and EMURGO, Intersect has signed continuity work contracts with an initial seven suppliers to deliver over 30 new functionalities and features to the network.

Looking ahead, through committees and working groups, members will play an integral role in shaping Cardano's roadmap by actively participating in developing the backlog. The development priorities, assignment of deliverables or tasks, and sustained enhancements to the core Cardano infrastructure will be guided by insights and recommendations from various specialized working groups and committees, including the pivotal TSC and, subsequently, the Delivery Assurance team within Intersect. For more detailed information and the latest updates on the continuity initiative and the activities of our Delivery Assurance team, we invite you to explore our Knowledge Base.

Continuity delivery partners

Building Cardano is a decentralized effort. During Q1 of 2024, Intersect issued seven major continuity contracts to seven Intersect members to deliver more than 30 new and innovative functionalities and features for the community alone. These include:

• Input Output (IOG): Input Output’s infrastructure group is developing and testing the Cardano governance node in readiness for CIP-1694 and continuity maintenance.
  
• Galois: development of Zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) for future interoperability of the Cardano economy.
  
• Welltyped is developing new Log Structured Merge Tree implementations. These will store the ledger's UTXO set on disk rather than in memory, substantially increasing the number of UTXOs—supporting many more users—while also allowing nodes to run on cheaper, lower-spec machines.
  
• Tweag: is developing the Ouroboros Genesis mechanism, which enables new nodes to join the Cardano blockchain and bootstrap themselves without relying on a trusted service. It also allows nodes to become disconnected and rejoin the network similarly.
  
• Vacuum Labs: ensuring the continued practical use of the Ledger and Trezor hardware wallets for the Cardano community and enhancements to support the Conway era.
  
• Byron: launch & beta testing period to discover, fix bugs, and collect feedback on the Govtool web app.
  
• DQuadrant: developing a range of web app-based tooling to support the emergence of governance on Cardano and creating testing strategy best practice documentation that can be shared and applied across current and future tooling.
  
• EMURGO: producing educational materials covering key aspects of CIP-1694 alongside the development, testing, and support of the Cardano Serialization library.

In the coming weeks, we will publish the quarterly continuity plan, which dives deeper into all the work and upgrades currently in development. Additionally, backlog and budget ideation will emerge to create the first budget for Cardano, which will be presented at the Annual Members Meeting in Tokyo on October 3rd, 2024.

Get Involved

Intersect is a member-based organization for the Cardano ecosystem, advancing progress at the intersection of Cardano and its community. Join a rich community of like-minded people to help shape the future of Cardano. Let's build together—join us!

If you have any questions, ideas, or suggestions, please contact us via email, X, or LinkedIn.