Charles Hoskinson, the founder of Cardano, believes the network methodical development strategy (criticized by many for taking ages) is beginning to gain recognition as the industry battles ongoing attacks and exploits.

In a recent interview, Hoskinson compared Cardano’s development trajectory to Anthropic’s path in the evolution of the artificial intelligence industry. He outlined that the firm is currently the leader of the pack despite entering the market later than existing powerhouses like Google and OpenAI.

Instead of chasing speed, he said that Anthropic is successful because it adopted a disciplined philosophy regarding its development practices from the get-go. He believes Cardano is now experiencing a very similar shift in perception. This comes as developers and investors are increasingly prioritizing security and governance over “speed to market.”

“Google initially had the big lead and then OpenAI had the big lead and then somehow this Anthropic thing came out and they were able to leapfrog everybody. […] They hadn’t fundamentally changed, they just had the right mindset,” Hoskinson said in the interview with CoinDesk.

He also added that the same principle could eventually benefit Cardano:

“People are starting to wake up, especially in the age of AI hacking, where everything is getting broken, where speed to market is not the most desirable way.”

.@IOHK_Charles compares Cardano’s strategy to Anthropic’s rise.

Google had the lead. Then OpenAI. Then Anthropic leapfrogged both, not by moving faster, but by building differently.

Hoskinson says the same lesson could apply to crypto in the latest episode of Markets Outlook… pic.twitter.com/h36GiShZYV

— CoinDesk (@CoinDesk) July 23, 2026

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Security Incidents Strengthen Cardano’s Case

Hoskinson specifically referenced the most recent Kelp DAO exploit and the knock-on effects it had on Aave as examples of the risks, which are associated with prioritizing innovation over resilience.

In April, Kelp DAO suffered a massive exploit where $292 million was drained after attackers were able to forge cross-chain messages and withdraw unbacked rsETH through a misconfigured LayerZero bridge.

While Aave’s smart contracts were in no way compromised, the attacker deposited the fraudulent rsETH as collateral to borrow real assets. This essentially left the lending protocol with significant exposure to bad debt and triggered billions of dollars in TVL outflows before the team implemented recovery measures.

For Hoskinson, this particular episode demonstrated how vulnerabilities in one protocol can rapidly spread through the broader DeFi ecosystem and cause massive outflows and reputational damage:

“The recent AAVE thing and Kelp thing shows you how quickly you can lose your TVL (total value locked) and how uqickly you can lose your customer base. So, it works until it doesnt, and when it doesn’t, it’s catastrophic for the ecosystem.”

He argued that for stability to be lasting, this requires more than technically sound code:

“People want stability and it only comes from having a clear governance system, a clear software development system, and really goo dideas on how to develop a roadmap in a sustainable way.”

ADA’s Longstanding Underperformance

Hoskinson’s comments also come after a long time of built-up criticism from parts of the crypto community about how Cardano has prioritized academic research (arguably one of the protocol’s standout differentiators) at the expense of ecosystem growth.

Cardano remains one of the largest protocols by market capitalization. At the time of this writing, it’s at $6.2 billion, ranking as the 20th largest project in the industry – but that’s a far cry from where it used to stand, let alone from where proponents were hoping it would be. ADA is one of the worst performers of the past year, down 80% in the past 365 days. Ethereum, the smart contract platform Hoskinson often compares Cardano to, including in this interview, is down 48% in contrast. Bitcoin, the industry’s benchmark, is down 44%.

Hoskinson acknowledged that their decision-making hasn’t been flawless.

“It took us a long time to get here. A lot of mistakes were made, and I own the lion’s share of them as the leader.”

Nevertheless, he expressed confidence that the network is now positioned much better than in previous market cycles.

“Ultimately, I’m very happy with where wi sit, and I think we will grow very strongly over the next 12 to 24 months.”

Of course, it remains to be seen whether that prediction will come to fruition, but his broader argument also reflects an ongoing debate across industry proponents about whether the next phase of crypto adoption will come from protocols that come strong and move fast or those that prioritize security, governance, and long-term sustainability. Or perhaps both are not mutually exclusive?