The AI proxy market remains hot, with Virtuals and AI16Z becoming industry leaders.

At the beginning of 2025, the AI agency market continues to heat up, with a total market value exceeding $16.9 billion, showing a week-on-week growth of 22.7%. In this blue ocean, Virtuals Protocol and AI16Z stand out, becoming important barometers for observing this track.

Virtuals Protocol, as the main AI agent issuance platform on the Base chain, has a platform token VIRTUAL with a market capitalization exceeding 5 billion USD, ranking among the top 40 cryptocurrencies. In the Solana ecosystem, AI16Z serves as an AI-managed venture capital institution, with a market capitalization also surpassing the 2.5 billion USD mark.

Development History

Virtuals Protocol: From Game Guilds to AI Agent Issuance Platforms

Virtuals Protocol originated from the gaming guild PathDAO, established in 2021. After experiencing a downturn in the gaming guild market, the team decisively transformed and focused on the AI field. In 2024, they explored AI games on the Base chain and launched an innovative platform. Despite facing challenges in the early stages, the team achieved several breakthroughs in the AI domain, including the world's first Roblox AI RPG and AI games without game engines. Their virtual streamer Luna also achieved impressive results on short video platforms. Ultimately, the success of the GOAT project brought excellent development opportunities to Virtuals Protocol.

AI16Z: From Web 2 AI to Web 3 AI

AI16Z founder Shaw was originally a game developer before transitioning to the AI field. The project originated from a concept called "AI version degen Spartan," which disrupted people's inherent impressions of AI through its performance on social platforms. After communicating with industry insiders, Shaw was inspired to create an AI investor. When AI16Z was launched, it achieved its fundraising goal of 4,420 SOL in just 20 minutes, demonstrating the market's eager anticipation for this innovative model.

Product Kernel

Virtuals Protocol: AI's iOS

Virtuals Protocol serves as an AI agent issuance platform, functioning similarly to traditional app stores. The platform uses $VIRTUAL as the trading pair, and each AI agent token transaction consumes a certain percentage of $VIRTUAL. The platform establishes common standards for its AI agents, emphasizing precise planning, and provides a GAME framework to support autonomous operation and learning. In terms of products, Virtuals Protocol offers development tools to ensure the integrity of the ecosystem, and its model is quite similar to Apple's iOS.

AI16Z & ELIZA: Android in the AI Field

AI16Z is a fund managed autonomously by AI, employing a hybrid strategy that combines AI autonomous operation and community interaction mechanisms. ElizaOS is an open-source AI agent framework that allows developers to freely build and experiment. The core features of ELIZA include a role profile system, action system, providers, and evaluators, and it also has autonomous trading capabilities. Its openness fosters the growth of the developer ecosystem, but the token economy and ecological protocol are not strongly bound, resembling more of an Android model.

Concept Project Overview

In the Virtuals ecosystem, VIRTUAL is the protocol token with the highest market value, reaching 4.34B. Other important projects include analyst AIXBT, framework GAME, and fund VADER.

In the AI16Z/Eliza ecosystem, the AI16Z fund has the highest market value, reaching 2.29B. Other key projects include the framework ELIZA, simulated KOL DegenAI, and self-replicating SPORE, among others.

Catalysts Driving Coin Prices

Virtuals Protocol

The business model of Virtuals Protocol is clear, with its products closely tied to the coin price. To observe its development, one can pay attention to the trading volume of ecosystem tokens and the number of issued tokens. The platform emphasizes quality over quantity, aiming to incubate one high-quality project each week. Currently, the Virtuals Protocol ecosystem has 138 tokens, with 8 having a market value of over 100 million USD, accounting for 33.3% of the entire AI agent market.

AI16Z/Eliza

The AI16Z ecosystem is relatively loosely connected, and projects using the Eliza architecture do not directly feed back into the value of the AI16Z/Eliza tokens. Its strategy resembles "surrounding the city from the countryside," enhancing brand influence through extensive cooperation. The key to future market capitalization growth lies in the depth, speed, and breadth of collaborations with other protocols, such as recent partnerships with well-known framework protocols like ARC and FXN.