This is an opinion post written for CryptoPotato by Ken Timsit, Head of Cronos Labs

2023 is the year of artificial intelligence, and there’s no better time than now to take a deeper dive into the different types and use cases of AI — especially for startups and projects working at the intersection of AI and blockchain.

To carry the momentum into 2024, Web3 startups should get a better sense of what to focus on when developing projects at the intersection of blockchain and AI. The Cronos Accelerator Program has evaluated over 600 Web3 startup applications, which allowed us to gain an accurate sense of the current blockchain and AI landscape.

Coming from all around the world, the teams reviewed were working on the development of projects related to GameFi, NFT, DeFi, data, and infrastructure. Derived from those 600 applications, here are four main focus areas for projects in blockchain and AI.

Team Productivity

ChatGPT and Midjourney proved how generative AI can improve the productivity of creative designers, coders, customer support specialists, and other content creators. While this may not seem specific to the blockchain industry, reviewing the applications from newly-forming Web3 teams showed that it is the area where AI will create the most value for the blockchain industry.

Increasing the productivity of teams working on blockchain protocols is a critical imperative as these protocols increasingly have to contend with local regulations, labor-intensive compliance, and multi-language localization. The best path forward for blockchain protocols is to augment team productivity by using AI tools in every department – such as software development, marketing, risk management, product design, and customer service.

For example, we have seen SaaS projects like Notifly, which use AI to create digests of what is going on in the community of other start-ups across Discord servers and Twitter spaces, two platforms widely used by Web3 projects for user engagement. In software development,

User Experience

Blockchain protocols might work wonders on the backend, but that would mean nothing if they fail to provide a smooth user experience with clean screens and simple interfaces since no one other than the crypto-savvy minority would use them.

An ideal Web3 user experience should utilize AI to guide users as they navigate through product fun