cosmos

Prop 1005: Bridging Worlds: Empowering Cosmos with an Ethereum NFT Bridge

Summary

Ark Protocol requests 47,600 ATOM (≈ $200 000, using a 30 d avg price of $4.20/ATOM) from the Community Pool to build an open-source, EVM-based NFT bridge compliant with ICS-721.

Motivation

Ether­eum hosts a $15 B+ NFT market, but Cosmos lacks a direct, audited EVM-compatible bridge for ICS-721 tokens. By funding Ark Protocol to build and operate this bridge, the Hub:

  • Unlocks instant NFT liquidity for ATOM holders
  • Onboards EVM-native communities into Cosmos
  • Accrues sustainable revenue, as all fees are held/swapped into ATOM

Project Scope

  1. Solidity ICS-721 Bridge Contract
  2. Front-end Toolkit for seamless transfer flows
  3. 12-month Operations: node hosting, monitoring, DevOps
  4. Security Audit & Remediation

Ark has production experience deploying CW-based NFT modules on Injective, Juno, Neutron, Osmosis, Stargaze, Terra - and contributed heavily to the core cw-ics721 and cw-nfts repos.

Budget & Milestones (Total: $200 000 / 47 600 ATOM)

Phase Amount (USD) ATOM Deliverable
1) Development $ 90 000 21 429 Architecture & Solidity ICS-721 implementation
2) Operations $ 60 000 14 286 12 mo support: hosting, monitoring, DevOps
3) Audit $ 50 000 11 905 Third-party security audit + remediation

Funds are released in three tranches upon Dev Start, Testnet Deployment, and Mainnet Launch.

Treasury & Oversight

All funds will be managed by the Ark Oversight DAO Members & signers:

  • Sistla (OmniFlix + StreamSwap): cosmos1nqchg6qytz6mvq85r6adsuaghfwnczex9hs02m
  • Zerk (Mad Scientists): cosmos1pwha5a3hr55wmmur2d4fm0p8rf7q62wn2rvzw8
  • Johnny Wyles (Osmosis): cosmos1dplx2zw3mjk5lam6fnv5q2yxldcshs3wh2rhh9
  • David Goose (Osmosis): cosmos1ky9hyqhdxygkkyvjcdd76qceq7t9syy488rsjm
  • Tatsen (Ark Protocol): cosmos1trghmhd4d9qcf9d0lsyesxzj3aasqg9slykml5
  • Mr T (Ark Protocol): cosmos1vtpt9kwjywm3xpake4v8sjmh2uxqq57h499qa5

Full discussion: Bridging Worlds: Empowering Cosmos with an Ethereum NFT Bridge

Conclusion

Approving this proposal will:

  • Bootstrap a robust, audited NFT bridge for CosmosEVM
  • Deepen on-chain NFT use-cases and liquidity for ATOM
  • Generate ongoing value and revenue accrual in ATOM

We appreciate the community's support in uniting Cosmos and Ethereum's NFT ecosystems.