We launched the Espresso Partner Program earlier this year, a seasonal incentive program designed to recognize and reward the pioneering teams building alongside us. Today, we're proud to announce the recipients from Season 0, which ran through the second quarter of 2025.

These founding partners have helped propel the Espresso Network from vision to reality, accelerating its adoption as the purpose-built base layer for the future internet, delivering what thousands of appchains and general-purpose rollups will need to seamlessly compose.

Season 0 Recipients

The Espresso Foundation is rewarding the following teams due to their technical contributions, integration efforts, and commitment to building a more composable Ethereum ecosystem. These partners will be allocated tokens from a dedicated portion of the Espresso Network's initial $ESP token supply.

Production Integrations

• RARI Chain – Our first mainnet launch partner; integrated with the Espresso Network on both testnet and mainnet to secure their sequencer and protect against reorgs, while contributing to Espresso's composability R&D efforts

• AppChain – Successfully integrated with the Espresso Network on both testnet and mainnet, gaining fast confirmations that enhance security and enable composability with other integrated chains

• LogX – Completed integration with the Espresso Network on testnet and mainnet for sequencer security and crosschain composability benefits

• Molten – Achieved integration milestones on testnet and mainnet, leveraging the Espresso Network for reorg protection and enhanced interoperability

Research & Development Contributors

• Automata – Open-sourced the trusted execution environment (TEE) code used in the Espresso Arbitrum Nitro integration

• Cartesi – Participated in multiple Espresso testnets, built a custom Cartesi integration, and made significant technical contributions to Espresso's composability research

• Celo – Pioneered technical contributions as the first OP Stack integration with Espresso (see Celo roadmap for details)

• Hyperlane – Made substantial technical contributions to Espresso's composability research, with Hyperlane code supporting some new and exciting crosschain products in the works

• Superposition – Contributed R&D insights and ongoing collaboration around a potential new crosschain product

Testnet Contributors

• Comet, DCA Monster, DrawingCanvas – Each of these teams have contributed by deploying and testing integrations on Espresso testnets

We also want to acknowledge the ongoing collaboration with Offchain Labs, Caldera, AltLayer, Distributed Lab, and We3, whose contributions continue to strengthen the Espresso ecosystem, and the many developers who earned $100k in prizes from our Build & Brew Hackathon.

Program Structure and Evaluation

As outlined in our original announcement, the Espresso Partner Program operates on a seasonal basis, with each round recognizing integration milestones and contributions from that period. Allocations for Season 0, which ran through the second quarter of 2025, were evaluated across five key criteria: depth of Espresso adoption, ecosystem impact, collaboration quality, team expertise, and integration effort.

This multi-dimensional approach ensures we're recognizing not just technical achievement, but the full spectrum of contributions that strengthen the Espresso Network. From the extensive testnet work by infrastructure partners like Caldera and AltLayer, to the production deployments by RARI Chain and AppChain, to the research contributions from teams like Hyperlane and Automata—each type of contribution plays a vital role in building a robust, interconnected ecosystem.

The Network Effect in Action

We're starting to see the early signs of network effects taking hold. While it's still early days, the patterns are encouraging: each new integration makes Espresso more attractive to the next wave of builders.

The teams that joined us in Season 0 positioned themselves at the ground floor of this growth. As the network expands and these effects compound, early participants stand to benefit disproportionately from the ecosystem they helped create.

For teams still evaluating whether to integrate with Espresso, the question isn't whether network effects will emerge—it's whether you'll be part of the cohort that drives them or the one that follows in their wake.

Looking Ahead

Season 0 represents just the beginning. As we transition to Season 1, the technical foundations laid by our founding partners will help streamline the next wave of integrations.

The future of Ethereum is thousands of specialized chains working together seamlessly. Our Season 0 partners took the first steps toward making this vision reality.

For teams interested in joining future seasons, reach out to us on Twitter to explore integration opportunities.