StarkWare is the Israeli cryptography company behind STARK zero-knowledge proofs, Starknet, and StarkEx — the $8B protocol-layer infrastructure scaling Ethereum.
StarkWare is an Israeli cryptography company that turned STARK proofs — a class of zero-knowledge proof systems — into production-grade infrastructure for scaling and validating computation on public blockchains. Headquartered in Netanya, it is the most institutionally significant Israeli company operating at the protocol layer of the global crypto stack.
The company was founded in 2018 by Eli Ben-Sasson, Uri Kolodny, Michael Riabzev, and Alessandro Chiesa, and grew directly out of academic research on transparent, scalable proof systems. Ben-Sasson, a long-tenured professor at the Technion, is the academic figure most identified with the STARK family and co-authored the foundational papers that gave the technology its name. Chiesa, a UC Berkeley professor, is also a co-founder of Zcash and a co-inventor of the earlier zk-SNARK system that underlies it.
StarkWare at a Glance
| Company | StarkWare Industries Ltd. |
| Founded | 2018, Netanya, Israel |
| Co-founders | Uri Kolodny (CEO) · Eli Ben-Sasson (President, Technion professor) · Michael Riabzev (Chief Architect) · Alessandro Chiesa (Chief Scientist, UC Berkeley professor) |
| Product | STARK-based zero-knowledge proof technology — Starknet (permissionless L2) + StarkEx (permissioned scaling engine) |
| Total funding | $287M across six rounds |
| Valuation | $8B (Series D, May 2022) |
| Key investors | Sequoia Capital, Paradigm, Coatue, Tiger Global, Greenoaks, Vitalik Buterin, Amnon Shashua, Coinbase, Intel Capital, Altshuler Shaham |
| Status | Private |
What a STARK actually is
STARK stands for Scalable Transparent ARgument of Knowledge. A zero-knowledge proof lets one party prove that a computation was carried out correctly without re-running it and, optionally, without revealing the inputs. STARKs carry two properties that set them apart within that field. They are transparent — they need no trusted setup ceremony, the step in many competing systems where a secret must be generated and then reliably destroyed. And they are scalable — proving time grows quasi-linearly with the size of the computation while verification stays cheap, so one small proof can attest to an enormous batch of transactions.
The trade-off is proof size. STARK proofs are larger than the SNARK proofs used by several competitors, which means more data posted on-chain. Because STARKs rely on hash functions rather than elliptic-curve pairings, they are also considered resistant to attack by future quantum computers — a property the SNARK families do not share. In practice the industry has settled into two principal cryptographic families for zero-knowledge rollups: the STARK family, which StarkWare pioneered, and the SNARK family used by several peers.
Products and positioning
StarkWare ships three things that matter.
StarkEx is a permissioned scalability engine — an application-specific scaling product that trading and gaming platforms plug into rather than a public network. It has been used by dYdX (historically), Sorare, Immutable, and others to batch large volumes of trades or mints off-chain and settle them on Ethereum with a single STARK proof.
Starknet is the public, permissionless, general-purpose Layer 2 network on Ethereum. Any developer can deploy a contract, and transactions settle to Ethereum under STARK validity proofs. Starknet is the company's bet on an open ecosystem rather than a set of bespoke integrations.
Cairo is the programming language StarkWare built for provable computation — the language in which Starknet contracts and StarkEx logic are written. Cairo is the connective tissue: it turns ordinary program logic into something a STARK can prove, and its adoption is a leading indicator of how much is being built natively on StarkWare's stack.
The competitive field
StarkWare competes in the Ethereum Layer 2 category alongside Polygon, zkSync (Matter Labs), Arbitrum, and Optimism. That field splits along a technical fault line. Optimistic rollups — Arbitrum and Optimism — assume transactions are valid and open a challenge window during which fraud can be proven. Validity, or zero-knowledge, rollups — StarkWare, zkSync, and Polygon's zk efforts — prove correctness up front with cryptography, removing the challenge delay at the cost of heavier proving. StarkWare's differentiation inside the validity camp is its commitment to the STARK family: transparent, post-quantum, and engineered for scale.
Funding and Valuation Arc
StarkWare's valuation trajectory was among the most dramatic in blockchain infrastructure. A $50 million Series C led by Sequoia Capital in November 2021 valued the company at $2 billion. By March 2022, reports pointed to a $100 million Series D near $6 billion — tripling the valuation in three months. The round closed in May 2022 at $8 billion, with Greenoaks Capital and Coatue leading alongside Tiger Global. Total funding across all rounds reached $287 million. The investor list includes Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum's co-founder — a significant strategic validation for an Ethereum scaling company — alongside Israeli investors Amnon Shashua (Mobileye) and Altshuler Shaham. StarkWare employed roughly 70 people at the time of its Series C, one of the highest valuations per employee among Israeli companies in its category. In early 2024 the Starknet ecosystem introduced its STRK token to decentralize governance, turning Starknet from a StarkWare product into a community-governed public network. The company has not publicly raised at a different valuation since the 2022 peak, and its revenue and operating position are not disclosed in granular detail.
Position in the Israeli crypto cohort
StarkWare is the most academically credentialed and most-cited company in the protocol layer of the Israeli blockchain ecosystem — a primary reference point in any survey of Israel's footprint in zero-knowledge cryptography, a field where Israeli academic contributions run unusually deep. It sits within the broader Israeli digital-asset infrastructure cohort that includes Fireblocks in institutional custody, GK8 (acquired by Galaxy Digital), Curv (acquired by Coinbase), and Bancor in decentralized-exchange architecture. Where those companies built the rails for holding and moving assets, StarkWare built the mathematics for proving what happened to them.
What to Watch in 2026
Three threads matter for StarkWare's next phase. First, whether Starknet and Cairo capture enough developer mind-share to compete commercially with SNARK-based Layer 2 rivals such as zkSync, Scroll, and Linea. Second, how Ethereum's ongoing danksharding and proto-danksharding upgrades — which reshape rollup economics — affect the relative position of STARK-based architectures. Third, the capital-cycle question: whether StarkWare raises again, pursues an IPO, or continues operating as a self-sustaining private infrastructure company.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who founded StarkWare?
Uri Kolodny (CEO), Eli Ben-Sasson (Technion professor, STARK co-inventor), Michael Riabzev, and Alessandro Chiesa (UC Berkeley professor), in Netanya, Israel, in 2018.
What does StarkWare do?
StarkWare builds zero-knowledge proof technology that scales Ethereum — compressing thousands of transactions into a single proof, enabling faster and cheaper blockchain operations.
How much has StarkWare raised?
$287 million across six rounds, reaching an $8 billion valuation in May 2022.
What is Starknet?
A permissionless Layer 2 network on Ethereum where any developer can deploy smart contracts and benefit from zero-knowledge scaling.
Did Vitalik Buterin invest in StarkWare?
Yes. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin is an investor in StarkWare.
Who are StarkWare's competitors?
Matter Labs (zkSync), Polygon (zkEVM), Optimism, and Arbitrum in the Ethereum L2 scaling space.
Related Olam Coverage
Fireblocks · Amnon Shashua · Altshuler Shaham · The Jewish Crypto Billionaires: Buterin, Novogratz, StarkWare, Fireblocks, eToro · Eli Ben-Sasson: STARKs Inventor and StarkWare Co-Founder
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