Building a dApp: Build from scratch or integrate Altius?

by Long Hau

When developing a blockchain project, teams are often faced with two options: build custom infrastructure from scratch tailored to their specific needs, or use modular solutions like Altius for faster integration and scalability. Both approaches have their pros and cons, but in a fast-moving blockchain landscape, building from scratch might carry more risk than you think

Advantages of Building Custom Infrastructure

Full Control: Creating your own infrastructure allows complete customization—from architecture to performance—to match your project’s unique vision.

Tailored Optimization: You can fine-tune the system to meet specific requirements, such as optimizing for a particular use case (DeFi, gaming, or payments).

However, these advantages often come at a high cost, especially considering the rapid evolution of blockchain technologies.

Disadvantages of Building from Scratch: Greater Risk Than You Think

While building a blockchain infrastructure from the ground up may sound ideal, the reality is far more complex. Below are the key drawbacks that highlight why this approach could set your project back:

1. Long Development Cycles
   Building the entire stack—from execution to storage and consensus—can take 12 to 18 months or more. During this time, your team must design, develop, test, and deploy the system. Meanwhile, the market continues to evolve. A solution that takes 18 months to finish might already be obsolete by launch—just as Altius put it:
   “By the time it ships, it’s outdated.”

2. Rapid Technological Obsolescence
   Blockchain is among the fastest-evolving tech fields. New protocols, virtual machines (VMs) like zkVM, BitVM, and scalability upgrades are constantly emerging. If you go custom, your stack may lag behind modern standards—such as multichain compatibility or parallel processing. For example, an infrastructure optimized for EVM today might not be compatible with MoveVM or CosmWasm in the future, limiting your project.

3. Missed Market Opportunities
   The blockchain market waits for no one. Users demand speed, developers need scalability, and competitors are always ready to launch faster. If you take too long to build infrastructure, competitors using modular stacks may capture market share first.

DeFi and gaming projects, in particular, need high throughput (tens of thousands of TPS) to compete with centralized exchanges (CEXs) or Web2 systems like Visa/Mastercard. Delay means losing users and investors.

1. Risk of Losing Community In blockchain, community is everything. If your project takes too long to launch or falls short of performance expectations, the community might lose faith.

Investors, users, and devs may shift to faster-moving projects—especially when they see solutions like Altius offering instant performance (1–2 Giga gas/s, latency <100ms). Without visible momentum, your community may disengage, hurting your brand and growth potential.

1. High Costs & Technical Risks
   Building in-house requires a strong engineering team with deep knowledge in distributed systems, cryptography, and performance optimization. This is expensive and fraught with risks—security flaws or compatibility issues when integrating with other chains. Exploits in bridges or smart contracts show that custom development isn't always safe.

2. Difficult Cross-Chain Interoperability
   In a multichain world, interoperability is critical. Custom-built infrastructure often ends up as a siloed system that relies on bridges for cross-chain interaction—a major security risk (billions lost to bridge hacks). In contrast, modular solutions like Altius offer native cross-chain state synchronization, eliminating the need for fragile bridges.

3. Ongoing Maintenance Burden
   After launch, custom infrastructure needs continual maintenance and upgrades to stay current. This requires long-term resources, while modular solutions like Altius are designed to be futureproof, easing the burden on your dev team.

Integrating Altius: A Smarter Path to Blockchain Innovation

Rather than gamble with custom infrastructure, Altius offers a VM-agnostic execution layer that can plug into any Layer 1, Layer 2, or appchain. Here's why integrating Altius is the smarter move:

1. Faster Time-to-Market
   Altius enables projects to integrate a high-performance execution layer without building from scratch. With modules like Parallel Scalable Storage (PSS), Instruction-Level Parallelism (ILP), and the Application Code Assessor (ACA), Altius delivers throughput of 1–2 Giga gas/s and sub-100ms latency out of the box. You can launch fast and capture market demand before competitors do.

2. Futureproof Scalability
   Altius is designed for long-term blockchain growth. Its modular architecture supports multiple VMs—EVM, MoveVM, CosmWasm, zkVM, BitVM—and is compatible with Ethereum, Aptos, Sui, Cosmos, and more. Your project won't be locked into outdated tech.

3. Boosted Performance, Lower Costs
   With the upcoming Open Execution Network (OEN), Altius enables chains to tap into pooled compute power across many nodes, scaling almost linearly with node count. This reduces gas fees and handles traffic spikes (e.g., NFT mints) without congestion.

4. Seamless Cross-Chain Interoperability
   Altius eliminates the need for bridges by updating contract state atomically across chains, reducing security risks and enhancing UX in a multichain world.

5. Faster Community Growth
   Altius goes beyond performance. Its ACA module rewards smart contracts that are optimized for gas and throughput—motivating developers to build efficient apps and increasing the appeal of your ecosystem.

6. Backed by Leading Investors
   With $11M in funding from top-tier VCs like Pantera Capital, Founders Fund, DCG, and angels from Solana Foundation, Berachain, and Movement Labs, Altius has the support and credibility to build sustainably.

7. Easy to Integrate
   Advanced developers or new chains can start integrating Altius today via the closed testnet. Just reach out via [e-mail] or join the [Altius Discord]. Early integrators receive SDK access and priority support.

Build Once, Scale Forever With Altius

Spending 18 months building your own stack may result in an outdated product that fails to meet user demands or developer expectations. The risks—long development cycles, obsolete technology, missed market windows, and community attrition—make custom infrastructure a risky gamble.

Altius offers a better alternative: a modular, high-performance, futureproof solution that delivers Web2 speeds, near-infinite scalability, and secure cross-chain interaction without bridges. With a clear roadmap (EVM support, expansion to other VMs, OEN launch in 2026), Altius is the ideal choice for projects that want to build once, and scale forever.

Get in touch with the Altius team at [e-mail] or join the community to start integrating and take your project to the next level.

Don’t let time and tech outpace you, let Altius lead your blockchain future.