How Odos Became DeFi’s Power Engine

by
Victoria d’Este

Revealed: March 30, 2025 at 10:24 am Up to date: March 30, 2025 at 10:27 am

by Ana

Edited and fact-checked:
March 30, 2025 at 10:24 am

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In a DeFi world more and more outlined by complexity and fragmentation, Odos has carved out a novel function as a robust execution layer designed to make decentralized buying and selling smarter, quicker, and extra seamless. Odos is tackling one of many greatest challenges within the DeFi area—delivering the very best commerce outcomes in a extremely fragmented and complicated atmosphere—by specializing in two key areas: routing optimization and deep, cross-chain liquidity entry.

Main that effort is Ahmet Ozcan, Co-founder and CEO of Odos. On this interview, he shares how the platform got here to life, what units its know-how aside, and why the way forward for DeFi could rely on invisible infrastructure, agent-based techniques, and a better strategy to on-chain execution.

Are you able to share your journey to Web3? 

I truly got here to crypto and Web3 a bit late. I used to be working at IBM for a very long time, most just lately managing an AI staff. So I used to be already deep into AI when it began to get sizzling once more. Round 2020, I personally received into crypto.

After I stop IBM and began my firm, I wished to work on the intersection of AI and crypto. The opposite founders additionally had related backgrounds, so it was a fantastic match. However the actual turning level got here after I met the founders of The Graph Protocol. We began working with them and doing a little tasks.

Then 2021 got here—DeFi summer season occurred—and that actually caught my consideration. I used to be pissed off with the expertise, particularly on decentralized exchanges. The fragmentation was annoying. Like many founders, I used to be pushed by frustration and a need to unravel an actual drawback.

With my background in physics, optimization has all the time been vital to me. So, I began specializing in decentralized finance and routing optimization to deal with the fragmentation situation. My journey into Web3 was a bit later than others, however I believe my trade background brings a unique perspective.

May you stroll us by means of how the Odos routing algorithm works? What makes it distinctive?

Think about DeFi as a map, the place tokens are cities and swaps are roads connecting them. To get out of your enter token to the one you truly need, you usually must move by means of a number of cities or tokens.

Odos seems in any respect doable routes throughout all of the DEXs and swimming pools we help and identifies probably the most environment friendly path from begin to end. We begin by pulling in an enormous variety of swap choices; then, we start filtering out those that don’t make sense—perhaps they require additional tokens or have excessive fuel charges. Via this iterative elimination, we slim down the choices till we discover the neatest, most optimum route on your tokens.

What makes Odos totally different is that we don’t simply sew collectively particular person paths one after the other. We run a full optimization over your entire graph of doable swaps and token combos. That permits us to constantly discover higher combos and ship higher costs to customers.

Proper now, we’re additionally constructing a machine studying layer on prime of all the things to study from previous trades, make smarter selections quicker, and adapt to altering market circumstances in real-time. So, the system will get higher and higher over time.

In the event you may immediately enhance one a part of the DeFi ecosystem 10x to profit Odos, what would it not be?

I might 10x the adoption of agentic techniques—agent-based DeFi and intent-driven interfaces. As we transfer away from the click-based DeFi interfaces we use as we speak, customers will more and more depend on autonomous brokers to behave on their behalf.

As an alternative of manually executing each swap, customers will simply categorical intents like “get me the very best value” or “rebalance my portfolio.” This may enhance person expertise and scale back safety dangers. Brokers can function 24/7 and do far more than an individual attempting to navigate all the things manually.

So a flourishing agent ecosystem would actually drive demand for precisely the type of infrastructure we’re constructing at Odos.

How does Odos assess and reply to the challenges of liquidity fragmentation throughout chains and DEXs, particularly with the rise of Layer 2s, appchains, and non-EVM environments?

Liquidity fragmentation has all the time been a difficulty, nevertheless it’s getting worse with the rise of Layer 2s and appchains. Proper now, we’re fixing fragmentation inside particular person chains—aggregating as many DEXs and swimming pools as doable to provide customers the very best execution. However we’re additionally designing for the long run.

We envision a future the place customers—and particularly agent-based techniques—don’t care what chain they’re on. They simply need the very best final result. So we’re actively getting ready for a world the place Odos can function an execution engine throughout environments, dealing with cross-chain intents, messaging protocols, and even permissioned liquidity when wanted.

We don’t imagine in always transferring liquidity to new chains—that’s inefficient. For instance, have a look at what the OP Superchain is doing to unravel interoperability inside its ecosystem. That’s a fantastic start line.

As for deciding which chains to help, we rigorously monitor the place liquidity and customers are migrating. Not each chain is price integrating straight away. We contemplate person demand, sustainability, complete worth locked, and the way energetic the ecosystem is. We need to meet customers the place they’re with out spreading ourselves too skinny.

In what methods does Odos contribute to the general effectivity and value discovery in decentralized markets? Do you suppose DEX aggregators are under-recognized for his or her affect?

Sure, completely—they’re under-recognized. DEX aggregators like Odos play a essential function in making DeFi markets extra environment friendly. By routing orders throughout fragmented liquidity, we scale back spreads, unify pricing, and make arbitrage tougher to use.

We assist make sure that liquidity is used the place it’s wanted most, which improves the person expertise—even for these in a roundabout way utilizing Odos. We act as invisible infrastructure, coordinating move behind the scenes. Many individuals don’t understand it’s not only a assortment of DEXs—it’s the underlying infrastructure that actually powers DeFi.

How do you establish which protocols and chains to combine with? What requirements should they meet?

We get this query so much from new protocols and chains. We have a look at a mixture of liquidity depth, person demand, technical maturity, and safety. Our north star is all the time person execution high quality—does this integration meaningfully enhance it?

We additionally have a look at composability and the way steady the protocol is, how straightforward it’s to observe and preserve, and whether or not there’s actual financial exercise—not simply farming after which abandonment. We attempt to steadiness exercise and safety, that are the 2 most vital components.

Odos has been built-in with a number of main protocols. What defines a worthwhile or strategic partnership for you?

We outline strategic partnerships by three key issues: significant liquidity, infrastructure innovation, and shared distribution. A great accomplice both brings belongings and swimming pools our customers want, presents infrastructure like bridges or intent layers that improve our routing, or helps prolong our attain to extra customers.

We additionally worth philosophical alignment—companions who imagine in abstraction, composability, and lowering person friction. Strategic worth goes each methods: the protocols we combine into and the platforms that combine us—like wallets, dashboards, meta-aggregators, and brokers. These companions use Odos as a backend engine to ship the very best trades, which extends our execution flywheel and strengthens the ecosystem.

As DeFi begins intersecting with AI-driven brokers, modular execution, and RWAs, how does Odos plan to remain related and responsive?

We’re already positioning Odos because the execution spine for this subsequent part of DeFi. On the agent facet, Odos is already getting used behind the scenes by early intent-based techniques. We’re designing interfaces for goal-oriented execution so brokers can request actions like rebalancing or liquidating with out micromanaging each step.

On the modular execution entrance, we’re making Odos composable so it could plug into numerous environments—whether or not it’s rollups, shared sequencing, or programmable automation layers.

As for RWAs (real-world belongings), the chance is large. These belongings nonetheless want environment friendly, safe on-chain execution—particularly within the early levels. Whether or not it’s tokenized treasuries or actual property, Odos can guarantee environment friendly transaction routing.

May Odos evolve into one thing past a DEX aggregator—perhaps a broader execution layer for on-chain finance?

I truly don’t like calling Odos an aggregator, because it suggests we simply acquire liquidity. However we consider it extra as an agentic navigation layer for on-chain finance.

As DeFi shifts towards intent-based and agentic techniques, we want infrastructure that may translate high-level targets into optimized on-chain execution. Excessive-level brokers like LLMs are nice for planning, however they’ll’t handle DeFi’s real-time dynamics. That’s the place Odos is available in—we’re constructing for precisely that future.

What are probably the most underappreciated technological or structural developments in DeFi as we speak that Odos is getting ready for?

One is RWAs and the necessity for permissioned execution. Many companions require KYC/AML-compliant entry to permissioned liquidity swimming pools. We’re designing Odos to help these necessities whereas nonetheless delivering sturdy execution so institutional customers can keep on-chain moderately than transferring to centralized exchanges or walled gardens.

The second underappreciated pattern is agentic techniques. Many individuals nonetheless consider them as easy bots. Nevertheless, as somebody with an AI background, I see how multi-agent techniques are already altering issues outdoors Web3. As soon as AI consultants begin constructing in crypto, how individuals work together with DeFi can be a game-changer.

What would a really optimum decentralized buying and selling expertise appear like? What are the remaining boundaries?

It ought to really feel like magic. Customers categorical what they need—the system handles the remainder. Our purpose is to develop into invisible.

It ought to be chain-agnostic, trust-minimized, and environment friendly. However danger administration and person expertise are nonetheless the largest hurdles. Folks nonetheless belief centralized exchanges extra, particularly in some nations. They battle with wallets, good contract dangers, MEV.

However brokers don’t care about belief—they function programmatically. Agentic execution will help take away these psychological boundaries and convey us nearer to a really decentralized expertise.

Are you able to please share the roadmap for Odos?

We revealed our roadmap at the start of the 12 months. This 12 months, we’re centered on cross-chain capabilities—not simply bridging however seamless experiences for DeFi customers. We’re additionally transferring past EVM chains, with Solana on the prime of the record.

Longer-term—and even inside this 12 months—we’re getting ready for RWAs, working with institutional customers, and understanding what agentic techniques really want. We’re having fascinating conversations with these companions, and we’re excited to launch new options subsequent 12 months based mostly on what we’re studying.

About The Writer

Victoria is a author on quite a lot of know-how subjects together with Web3.0, AI and cryptocurrencies. Her intensive expertise permits her to jot down insightful articles for the broader viewers.

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Victoria d’Este