Cryptography Everywhere: Q&A with Chain Reaction CEO Alon Webman and CTO Oren Yokev
Cryptography Everywhere – Chain Reaction Founders Detailed Vision in DigiTimes Q&A
In a featured interview with DigiTimes, Chain Reaction CEO Alon Webman and CTO Oren Yokev share their vision for the future of cryptographic computing and the company’s roadmap toward mass production. Speaking at the US–Taiwan Startup Forum, they outlined the growing global need for privacy-enhancing technologies and the importance of purpose-built hardware to accelerate cryptography at scale.
Chain Reaction, co-founded by Webman (previously of Mellanox) and Yokev (a cybersecurity and cryptography expert), is developing the Crypto Processing Unit (CrPU)—a custom ASIC designed to solve blockchain’s “trilemma” of decentralization, scalability, and privacy. Unlike software-only solutions that optimize for just one or two of these pillars, the CrPU uses hardware acceleration to deliver exponential gains in performance, throughput, and cost efficiency—up to 1,000x in future iterations.
The team emphasizes that Taiwan’s TSMC and global supply chain integration are key to their high-volume manufacturing strategy. With offices already established in Israel, Taiwan, and the US, Chain Reaction is positioned for global growth. The company plans to launch its first hardware product in the second half of 2021, starting on 7nm and 6nm technology nodes, with a 5nm product on the roadmap by the end of 2022.
Their long-term outlook sees cryptography as a foundational layer across cloud, mobile, IoT, and automotive applications—powering everything from blockchain to secure multiparty computation and V2V communication in the age of quantum computing.