Metis Hyperion: Igniting Hope for AI Narratives on Ethereum?

1. Overview of Metis Hyperion

Metis, as a member of the Ethereum L2 ecosystem, launched the Andromeda mainnet early based on Optimistic Rollup technology. Its biggest feature is the decentralized sequencer, which gives transaction ordering rights to community participants. In March 2025, Metis announced a dual-chain strategy: launching the high-performance Hyperion chain based on the existing universal chain Andromeda. The former is positioned as a secure and reliable general-purpose L2, while the latter focuses on high-frequency, high-throughput, and AI-driven application scenarios. Hyperion is built on the Metis SDK, and its core is the new MetisVM virtual machine (compatible with EVM, supporting AI-optimized instructions), aiming to optimize scalability and decentralization while greatly improving transaction efficiency.

Hyperion is committed to building a "high-performance, AI-native" L2 network that can achieve near millisecond transaction confirmations and ultra-high transaction throughput, making AI-native applications (such as on-chain LLM inference and decentralized AI agents) possible. Metis emphasizes security and decentralization through a dual-chain architecture, while Andromeda focuses on high performance and AI applications, providing complementary support for different application scenarios.

The development roadmap of Metis can be summarized in two points: First, continuously improving the core L2 infrastructure, such as the addition of real-time data availability migration and fraud proof mechanisms in the Andromeda upgrade in May 2025, making it the industry's first "truly decentralized" Layer 2; Second, moving towards modularity and multi-chain interoperability, reducing development barriers through the Metis SDK to promote the growth of a multi-chain ecosystem. The launch of Hyperion has, to some extent, reshaped the value logic of the METIS token: making Metis no longer just an L2, but transforming into a "multi-chain infrastructure + AI dedicated chain" platform.

2. On-chain LLM? What is the logic implemented by Metis?

2.1 AI ecosystem closed loop three-piece set: SDK, Hyperion, LazAI

Hyperion, as an Optimistic Rollup, inherits the security model of Metis and the Optimism family, primarily making advancements in parallel computing, data availability, and decentralization. The main optimization focus is on AI and high-frequency application scenarios. Specifically, Metis promotes ecosystem development through the Metis SDK + Hyperion + LazAI three major systems.

• Parallel Execution Engine: Hyperion introduces parallel execution technologies like Block-STM, allowing independent transactions within a block to run together. By adopting optimistic concurrency control and dynamic DAG scheduling algorithms, independent transactions in the same block can run simultaneously, significantly improving throughput;

• Decentralized Sequencer: The transaction sorting rights of Hyperion are shared by a multi-node network rather than being controlled by a single node or a few operators. The specific mechanism includes Leader Rotation and Encrypted Mempool combined with Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS) to prevent front-running and centralized interference;

• Data Availability: The Hyperion plan fully utilizes Ethereum's new features and external DA services to ensure data availability. With the advancement of Ethereum EIP-4844, Hyperion (and Andromeda) will directly publish transaction data to L1 through blob transactions to inherit Ethereum's security and reduce costs. According to official statements, Metis is also preparing to integrate EigenDA;

• Fraud Proof Mechanism: Hyperion continues to adopt an optimistic rollup model but has upgraded its fraud proof. Metis committed early on to introducing a complete fraud proof mechanism and data availability solution; its ReGenesis roadmap also proposed "executing the latest fault proof system from the OP Stack." In other words, Hyperion will adopt an interactive error correction mechanism: after the sequencer publishes a new block, there is a window period for "observers" in the network to submit challenges (e.g., a 7-day period) to prove the block is invalid. Once this challenge is successful, the malicious block will be rolled back, and the responsible party will be penalized.

In terms of AI native infrastructure: Metis SDK allows users to build their own L2 or L3 blockchain, which has integrated an upgraded EVM (called MetisVM) and parallel processing capabilities, along with a decentralized sorting mechanism. Hyperion is a high-performance AI-specific Layer 2 built using this SDK, combining Optimistic Rollup, parallel execution, and distributed sorting, achieving almost real-time transaction confirmation and on-chain AI inference. According to official sources, MetisVM improves transaction efficiency by approximately 30% through dynamic optimization of opcodes and parallel execution mechanisms. At the same time, MetisDB uses memory-mapped Merkle trees and concurrency control, achieving nanosecond-level state access, effectively eliminating storage bottlenecks. These technologies combined allow Hyperion to run AI inference tasks such as large language models (LLM) directly on-chain, laying a strong foundation for AI contracts.

In the aspect of AI narrative project incubation: Metis is also actively incubating AI-related projects, such as the LazAI protocol. This is an open network focused on "trusted AI data assets", aiming to address the issues of data opacity and inconsistency in AI usage. LazAI leverages blockchain's verifiable computation and standardized mechanisms to create an open, transparent data market, ensuring that AI models use high-quality data and can support cross-chain usage. Based on this protocol, Metis also launched the Alith framework, which is a development tool specifically tailored for AI agents on the blockchain. Developers can quickly write AI Agents on Metis using the Alith SDK and deploy them online. The official also provided a very practical example: users only need to send commands in natural language through a Telegram chatbot to complete DeFi operations such as lending, without needing to write smart contracts themselves. This design greatly lowers the threshold for ordinary people to use AI applications and makes the developers' work much easier.

2.2 Compared to other L2s, what capabilities does Hyperion enhance for Metis?

Hyperion is still based on Optimistic Rollup, and Metis has built differentiated competitiveness through forward-looking technologies and strategic layouts: technologies like Hyperion meet the performance requirements of AI applications, the dual-chain and SDK model balances general and specialized needs, and decentralized ordering enhances ecological trust. The differentiated competition with other L2s mainly reflects in aspects such as Hyperion architecture, dual-chain strategy, Metis SDK, and decentralized orderers.

High-performance execution layer: Metis Hyperion is an AI-oriented high-performance Layer 2, officially claiming to achieve near real-time settlement and Web2-level response speed through Optimistic Rollup, parallel execution, and distributed sorting technology. Hyperion introduces MetisVM------a virtual machine customized for high-frequency trading and AI tasks, featuring dynamic opcode optimization, parallel execution, and caching mechanisms, significantly improving the execution efficiency of smart contracts. At the same time, Hyperion has designed on-chain reasoning support for AI inference, including dedicated precompiled contracts and execution engine optimization.

Dual Chain Strategy (Andromeda + Hyperion): Metis retains the original Andromeda chain as a general-purpose L2, continuing to provide stable infrastructure for applications such as DeFi; at the same time, it launches Hyperion specifically to serve AI scenarios. This "dual network" architecture addresses the trade-off between generality and specialization: it not only avoids stagnation in homogeneous competition with other L2s but also finds a dedicated space for AI applications.

Metis SDK and Developer Ecosystem: Metis SDK is a modular toolkit for developers that integrates blueprints, building tools, and standard interfaces, allowing developers to quickly build custom execution layers or applications. Metis SDK enables developers to rapidly deploy Layer2/Layer3 using mature modules, and facilitates smooth migration or interaction between Andromeda and Hyperion, significantly enhancing ecosystem construction efficiency and interoperability.

Decentralized Sorter: In 2024, Metis successfully launched the industry's first fully decentralized sorter, transferring transaction sorting rights to community nodes and a staking mechanism. This mechanism achieves fault tolerance and censorship resistance through rotating consensus nodes and incentive token governance, completely eliminating the risk of single points of failure.

3. If Ethereum focuses on L1, how will Metis respond?

3.1 If the main chain doesn't distribute rewards, Metis will build its own candy factory.

Assuming that Ethereum will focus on the development of its own L1 (such as underlying consensus and sharding upgrades) instead of continuing to expand L2 directly, how can L2 platforms like Metis maintain and expand their influence? According to the All in AI strategic roadmap released by Metis, the current strategy for Metis is to follow a modular and multi-chain approach.

First of all, Metis's dual-chain architecture and MetisSDK provide it with the capability to build multiple dedicated chains. Meanwhile, the launch of Hyperion marks Metis's transformation from a "single L2" to a "modular multi-chain infrastructure". Through MetisSDK, any team can quickly create customized blockchains like building blocks—configuring parallel execution consensus, EVM-compatible layers, AI-optimized VMs, on-chain storage, and other components. This means that Metis not only operates two chains but can also support more "industry-specific chains": such as AI computation chains, DePIN infrastructure chains, and gaming chains, each meeting different scenario needs.

Secondly, Metis emphasizes cross-chain interoperability and a collaborative ecosystem. The official roadmap and community communications have repeatedly mentioned the introduction of cross-chain bridging and data/computation aggregation mechanisms. It is not difficult to see that Metis will integrate Chainlink CCIP, allowing assets and smart contracts to flow freely between Metis and other public chains. The Hyperion architecture also emphasizes "shared bridge + cross-chain interconnection" and proposes "decentralized data and computation aggregation," connecting AI applications with various data networks and computing resources.

The community is not only users but also direct participants and beneficiaries of the network operation. By opening the role of the sorter, anyone can become a block proposer through staking and receive sorting rewards. At the same time, Metis plans to introduce an AI node operation incentive mechanism to encourage more developers to deploy inference services that provide on-chain AI capabilities.

3.2 Metis All in AI strategy, how to drive ecological development through AI

Let’s get straight to the point: There are significant centralization risks and performance bottlenecks with using AI services on-chain, such as transmitting results via oracles. To address these issues, Hyperion and LazAI have collaborated to introduce an AI agent framework called Alith. Developers can use the Alith SDK to write "AI agents" and deploy them as contract modules on Hyperion. These agents can handle functions like model selection, inference logic, and fault recovery, and can be directly called by other contracts on-chain, enabling functionalities such as chatbots, prediction tools, or DAO assistants. Through mechanisms like pre-compiled contracts, Hyperion incorporates AI inference into the on-chain execution process, and inference results can be fixed on-chain through logs, reproducible actions, or trusted execution environments, ensuring verifiable trust. This approach preserves the transparency of blockchain while meeting the computational demands of AI, truly promoting "AI on-chain."

Additionally, Hyperion's parallel processing and low latency are particularly suitable for AI tasks. As long as there are no conflicts between requests, they can run simultaneously, and the efficiency is significantly higher than that of traditional L2 sequential execution. MetisVM has also specifically optimized for AI, such as using Rust/WASM to improve performance and supporting various inputs like text and images, allowing AI models to run directly on-chain. This entire design is aimed at achieving what Metis calls "the first Layer 2 protocol that can locally run large language models on-chain."

![Metis Hyperion: AI for Ethereum