Design overview
The problem: attestation, not raw capability
Autonomous systems can already execute impressive physical work: drone inspection, robotic manipulation, 3D reconstruction. In many deployments, the execution record is operator-attested — produced and signed by the same party that ran the machine. That is acceptable in closed, low-stakes environments; it is structurally insufficient when the consumer of the record carries liability: a regulator, an insurer pricing risk, or an engineering sign-off on a multi-million-dollar decision.
The missing piece is independent verification: evidence and scoring that are uncorrelated with the operator’s self-interest, backed by cryptography and clear economic penalties for fraud.
Konnex addresses this with a decentralized network where:
Task instructions are signed and anchored onchain.
Miners compete to execute under subnet rules.
Validators with no operational stake in a given operator score execution against the instruction.
Proof-of-Physical-Work (PoPW) binds policy traces and sensor evidence (including hardware-level attestation where applicable) into a single verifiable record.
Workload classes (subnets), not one generic “chat” market
Konnex is organized by workload class — each subnet corresponds to a real commercial pattern (aerial inspection, manipulation, 3D/SLAM) with its own input schema and scoring function. That allows:
Enterprises to negotiate scoring that reflects real contracts, not only synthetic leaderboards.
Miners to specialize in one class (e.g. SLAM) without competing on every other robot modality.
Live on testnet today: drone navigation, roboarm VLA, and SLAM 3D map. Signed enterprise counterparties are active in these workload classes; their full commercial execution may still run offchain in their own environments while the testnet demonstrates the verification and settlement layer that mainnet is meant to host.
Two protocol layers in the long-run design
Coordination and verification — Mesh-friendly transport, onchain registries, PoPW, validator economics (see Protocol architecture). Mesh transport and full robot–robot contract products are staged; see the roadmap.
Settlement — Stablecoin-denominated escrows, penalties, and rewards for enterprise users, with KNX for protocol security, governance, and gas routing — a dual-token design so operational teams can budget in fiat-pegged terms. Full stablecoin mainnet dual-staking is not all live on the first public testnet; see Stablecoins integration and the roadmap.
Inheritance from Bittensor-style subnet economics
Konnex inherits the network topology and incentive shape familiar from production-style subnet networks such as Bittensor — subnet creators, miners, validators, and stakers — so experienced node operators can onboard with minimal relearning. The workload and verification layer is different by design: physical tasks need Proof-of-Physical-Work, not only statistical quality of text outputs.
Where to start
Example policy (abridged, manipulation-style)
The subnet turns this class of task into a concrete schema, simulator or sensor checks, and PoPW requirements.
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