A step back to our beginning…

This year Colossus turns 4 years old. Now in its fourth year, we can say that Colossus Digital has become a recognised authority in institutional blockchain infrastructure. We act as the connective tissue between institutional capital and decentralised networks. Our technology lets banks, asset managers and funds transform dormant digital assets into compliant, audited yield, without ever compromising on security or governance. Let's take a trip back in time and retrace its history together…

Born as validator, guardian of the chain

In 2021, we deployed our first validator nodes from a single co-location rack. What began as one chain quickly expanded into 150+ servers across more than 20 proof-of-stake networks. Those early nights of fine-tuning fail-overs and studying networks, forged our culture: meticulous, resilient, obsessed with uptime.

Yet even perfect validation could not answer a pivotal client question: “How do we hold these assets safely and still participate in staking?”

That question set the stage for our first major evolution.

Becoming a regulated custodian: Trust starts with safekeeping

We made the first step forward with a client, a fund, becoming regulated custodians. When a forward-looking fund asked us to safeguard its tokens, to a regulated asset protection, we realised the ecosystem needed a regulated on-ramp. We secured OAM registration, implemented AML/KYC processes, and bought a Fireblocks licence. From that moment, with us, counterparties could move and store digital assets under an Italian regulatory umbrella, while maintaining the operational agility they expect from capital-markets infrastructure.

It was just a first step to the right direction to understand the real problem. Still, one gap remained: secure custody was not yet connected to on-chain yield.

Institutional Hub: Bridging custody and Staking, one Signature at a Time

Working side-by-side with institutions, as custodians and offering also staking as a service, we discovered a clear gap: institutions needed a single pane of glass that could connect their preferred custodians to the on-chain opportunities they sought, without operational risk or fragmented workflows.

• At the moment we designed Institutional Hub:

• A single interface to stake, earn rewards and vote on governance.

• All signing policies executed inside the client’s chosen custody environment.

• End-to-end audit trails that satisfy both regulators and internal risk committees.

For the first time, institutions could generate yield without compromising their security standards.

Carrying the message worldwide

We took our open-architecture model from Rome to keynote stages in London, Dubai and Singapore. Whether presenting to validators working groups or demonstrating Hub to global custodians, we delivered the same promise: security, compliance and yield can coexist. The response was decisive; interest soon arrived from different continents. They now understand that the future of blockchain is handled by institutional players and that investing in staking is first of all a method to generate yield from assets in custody, otherwise locked, and secondly to support the network.

Scaling people, assets and trust

With product-market fit proven, we expanded carefully:

• We grew our headcount with seasoned security engineers, risk officers, and client-success specialists.

• Assets under infrastructure multiplied, and our client roster expanded to include global custodians, asset managers, exchanges, funds etc.

Today our infrastructure safeguards millions in delegated assets, and our client roster spans custodians, exchanges, foundations and tier-one asset managers. We now sit at the centre of a strategic triangle, stakeholders, custody providers and validators, and that position demands constant reinvention.

What's next? A New Identity & Institutional Hub new UI & UX

To match our expanded mandate, we are:

• Refreshing our brand: new visuals, clearer language and a design system that speaks to both Web 3 innovators and finance leaders.

• Launching Institutional Hub new UI & UX: rebuilt for higher throughput, deeper analytics and effortless multi-custody coordination.

• Extending our product horizon: from staking and re-staking to liquid delegation, governance analytics and automated compliance reporting.

Our ambition is straightforward: make digital-asset participation as intuitive as online banking and as transparent as a blockchain explorer, under the shelter of regulation.