Hello everyone,
This post is not intended as a formal proposal, but rather as a way to take the temperature of the community around an idea that occasionally surfaces in discussions across the interchain ecosystem: the possibility of a deeper structural alignment between Neutron and the Cosmos Hub.
A bit of context may be useful. Neutron was initially launched as a smart contract platform closely aligned with the Hub through Replicated Security (ICS). At the time, this model created a strong structural relationship between the two chains: the Hub provided security while Neutron focused on becoming a core CosmWasm execution environment for the interchain.
However, the landscape has evolved over the past months. Neutron is no longer operating under Replicated Security, and the Cosmos Hub is moving toward removing the ICS code in an upcoming upgrade. At the same time, the Hub itself has been evolving: it now supports permissionless CosmWasm, and its roadmap increasingly points toward improved performance and expanded capabilities that overlap with what Neutron originally set out to provide.
Because of this convergence, it raises an interesting strategic question: if both chains are progressively moving toward similar capabilities high-performance infrastructure, permissionless CosmWasm execution, and interchain-facing services could a closer structural alignment, or even a form of chain merge, make sense for the ecosystem?
One area where this could be particularly compelling is the development of liquidity infrastructure and financial primitives around the Hub. For example, Duality introduces an orderbook-based liquidity layer that could play an important role in the broader interchain economy. If the Hub is positioning itself as a central infrastructure and coordination layer, having these kinds of market primitives closely integrated could create a more coherent and efficient economic stack.
Another important dimension is team alignment and long-term strategy. As the Cosmos Hub increasingly explores an institutional-facing roadmap, stronger coordination between teams building core infrastructure and those developing financial layers becomes increasingly important. Aligning experienced teams around a shared roadmap could help create a more credible and coherent institutional strategy for the ecosystem.
There are also ecosystem initiatives such as Hydro and Cycles that may naturally gravitate toward the Hub environment over time. If these projects were to anchor more directly around the Hub, having experienced teams already familiar with these systems could be extremely valuable. Supporting complex DeFi or infrastructure initiatives often requires deep operational experience, and stronger collaboration between teams could significantly improve the chances of success.
More broadly, this kind of alignment could help address a recurring challenge in the Cosmos ecosystem: coordination. Appchain sovereignty is one of Cosmos’ greatest strengths, but it can sometimes lead to fragmented development efforts. Bringing together the capabilities, teams, and infrastructure currently split between Neutron and the Cosmos Hub could help create a more unified direction for the interchain.
From a strategic perspective, aligning the Hub’s evolving infrastructure role with the execution environment and financial primitives that Neutron has been developing could strengthen the overall ecosystem architecture.
The goal of this post is simply to hear the community’s thoughts.
How do you feel about the idea of a merge between Neutron and the Cosmos Hub ?
Curious to hear different perspectives from the community.