It's been a while since Dizi mentioned the #Aztec @aztecnetwork project in Beijing. Back then, it was a CCA auction, raising 19,476 ETH. Truly impressive! Moreover, over 50% of the subscription funds came from community members, demonstrating the community's strong support for this project. This might be the allure of the privacy-focused field that Vitalik Buterin mentioned in the meeting, and it also owes much to the strong support from Aztec, as I discussed in the previous post. 👇 Previously, privacy was always associated with "outer encryption," an optional "shell." Now, privacy is no longer an "add-on feature" of blockchain, but is becoming a core requirement of the infrastructure. A leading privacy-first Layer 2 platform in the Ethereum ecosystem, Aztec Ignition Chain is designed for developers to build applications that truly protect user privacy. Aztec has launched Ignition Chain on the Ethereum mainnet and it continues to produce blocks, becoming the first truly decentralized Layer 2 network. The team, comprised of world-class cryptographers, secured $100 million in Series B funding led by a16z. They invented and defined a trustless client-side proof standard, fundamentally enabling privacy applications in public blockchain environments. Today, while scrolling through Twitter, Dizi saw an update on the project's Official Twitter. The website shows that the release date is still 01:01:35. This indicates that the project is fully prepared, and "the privacy infrastructure is in place." By this time next year, every smart contract will be private. Another point is that the Aztec team almost single-handedly built the complete technology stack for modern privacy computing. Today, almost all teams working on privacy are using the tools they developed. This is enough to demonstrate that technology pioneers are the leaders. JPMorgan Chase included Aztec in its Quorum team evaluation as early as 2019 to conduct privacy experiments for regulated financial scenarios. Taurus's confidential token standard is built directly on Aztec technology and has been adopted by leading institutional-grade infrastructure service providers. These cases demonstrate that Aztec is already a production-ready privacy infrastructure platform. In an industry where "speed" and "new narratives" often struggle to translate into long-term success, Aztec has broken into the mainstream thanks to its continuous technological accumulation, real institutional adoption, and the network surrounding its privacy cryptography ecosystem. As a16z has repeatedly emphasized, privacy is not a functional race, but a fundamental technology and a key component underpinning long-term financial infrastructure. Real-world applications are gradually being prepared for launch on the Aztec network. Programmable privacy represents a significant advancement in technology adoption and could potentially trigger a new wave of on-chain privacy applications, such as Perp privacy, which helps prevent targeted attacks and malicious attacks. With TGE on the horizon and the execution layer set to launch in Q1 2026, Aztec is already a leader in the privacy space. If you believe privacy will be the next standard infrastructure feature of blockchain, then Aztec is worth keeping an eye on. #Aztec #Privacy #Ethereum #Layer2