The Espresso Network has officially moved to a permissionless proof-of-stake blockchain with the launch of its ESP token, opening up participation in securing the network and distributing a community airdrop representing 10% of the total supply.
The transition coincides with the deployment of the ESP token, which is used for staking, thereby securing participation in the network and protocol. The Espresso Foundation said the total offering amounts to ESP 3.59 billion, of which 10% is allocated to a fully unlocked community airdrop aimed at early ecosystem participants and users of Espresso-integrated rollups.
“There were different ways to determine who was eligible,” Ben Fisch, CEO and co-founder of Espresso Systems, told CoinDesk in an interview. “The idea here is to circulate the token among members of our broader community, but also to reward early participation and adoption of the Espresso network.”
The foundation said an additional supply of tokens has been allocated for contributors, investors, future ecosystem incentives, and long-term network sustainability, with most allocations subject to vesting.
Espresso acts as a coordination and finality layer for rollups, which function as independent execution environments. Fisch said the network is specifically designed to serve Layer 2 blockchains rather than compete with them at the execution level.
“Layer 2 only needs one thing from layer 1, and that is finality,” Fisch said. “The quality of the provision of services by a layer 1 to a layer 2 is measured in two elements: the degree of security of this blockchain and the speed with which it can provide finality. »
“Unlike Ethereum or any other existing layer 1, it is designed for layer 2,” he added. “It doesn’t compete with L2s. It’s designed for L2s.”
Espresso currently finalizes rollup blocks in about six seconds on average, compared to Ethereum’s 12+ minute finality window (finalizing blocks means they become immutable). According to Fisch, this gap has become a structural bottleneck as applications and liquidity spread across multiple stacks rather than remaining concentrated on a single chain.
“Quick finality is not an advantage for rollups,” Fisch said. “It’s the missing piece that transforms isolated chains into a unified, composable ecosystem.”
The launch comes as the Ethereum ecosystem debates the future role of Layer 2 networks, following recent comments from Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin suggesting that the network could eventually move away from an L2-centric roadmap as improvements to Ethereum’s base layer reduce the need for rollups as a scaling solution.
This debate has raised broader questions about whether Layer 2 networks are extensions of Ethereum or independent blockchains in their own right, and whether the infrastructure designed primarily to scale Ethereum will remain relevant as the base layer becomes faster and cheaper.
As Ethereum’s long-term scaling strategy comes under renewed scrutiny, Espresso is betting that demand for application-specific rollups, particularly from institutions and mainstream platforms, will continue to grow regardless of Ethereum’s roadmap.
Read more: Espresso, a composability project between blockchains, puts the main product online
