Axelar network went live on mainnet at the beginning of 2022, providing secure interchain communication across Cosmos and EVM ecosystems. From there, the project didn't look back.

Here's a recap of everything that happened in Axelar's first year on mainnet, followed by a look-ahead to some of what's coming in 2023.

2022 Wrapped: Axelar's 1st year on mainnet

• Mainnet launch: Axelar network went live in January, followed quickly by the Satellite bridge app.
• Series B: in February, Axelar announced Series B financing closed at $1 billion valuation.
• The Axelar Grant Program: Axelar launched a grant program and ecosystem fund for idea-stage projects with a vision for mass adoption. Find out more & apply.
• Cosmos liquidity: Following the collapse of Terra’s UST stablecoin, Axelar’s infrastructure was used to bridge millions in USDC liquidity into Cosmos.
• General Message Passing went live on mainnet in May, enabling interchain NFTs and one-click interchain experiences for users.
• Interchain NFTs: the first natively interchain NFT was minted using Axelar in August, and the Axelar Robot Series was born.
• Quadratic voting was implemented on Axelar network in September, further decentralizing the Axelar network.
• Token release: the AXL token was released in September, providing broad access via top-tier exchanges and custodians to staking and governance on Axelar.
• Interop Summit: Axelar announced the Interop Summit to convene developers building for mass adoption in Web3.
• Network growth: In its first year on mainnet, Axelar network saw:
  • 30 chains connected.
  • $1.6B+ transfer volume.
  • 300,000+ transactions.
  • 120+ interchain contracts.
• Strategic partnerships: Axelar formed strategic partnerships with leading blockchain ecosystems and projects in 2022: Arbitrum, Circle, Osmosis, Polygon and Sui, to name a few. Read more.
• Ecosystem Funding Program: in December, Axelar launched its $60M Ecosystem Funding Program with top-tier VCs, to fund Web3 projects that are building for mass adoption. Find out more & apply.
• AXL "Winter Relief Shipment" airdrop program: Axelar opened the first AXL airdrop, to early adopters of the Satellite bridge. Learn more about this and other upcoming AXL airdrops.

Looking ahead to 2023

Here's a glimpse at what the Axelar ecosystem is looking forward to in 2023.

• The Interop Summit & new ecosystem learnings: building in the interchain is a new paradigm. Feb. 27-28 in Denver, we’ll convene leading chain-agnostic builders for a first-of-its-kind conference, the Interop Summit. And we’re bringing the same luminaries together in our communities on Discord, Telegram and Twitter, year-round.
• Axelar Ecosystem Startup Funding Program: there are 15+ Web3 VCs working with the Axelar ecosystem to identify projects that are building for mass adoption on the decentralized web. Learn more: https://axelar.network/funding-program.
• New chain integrations: Axelar already connects 30 of the most dynamic ecosystems in Web3. New chains are connecting every month; watch axelarscan.io and satellite.money to see the network grow.
• Airdrops, bounties and grants: AXL is the staking and governance token of the Axelar network. In September, 2022, it became publicly available. December brought the first AXL airdrop! Join the Axelar Discord or Telegram to get involved and start staking AXL.
• General Message Passing for Cosmos: extending General Message Passing to Cosmos chains and dApps, enabling Cosmos and EVM developers to call any function on any chain, across both ecosystems.
• Composable USDC: Axelar is working with Circle to bring liquidity into every application on every blockchain on the decentralized web. Learn about Composable USDC and read the developer documentation.
• Integrations with non-EVM blockchains: Axelar gateways and protocol semantics are being adopted across diverse languages: Move, Rust, Solidity, Javascript, and beyond. Axelar’s Stellar integration is only the beginning.
• Application-level security validation: protocols for dApp developers to implement additional checks to authorize transactions or deploy additional validator nodes.

Want to get involved? Head to the Axelar website for documentation, resources and ways to get in touch with our team.