On July 10, Swiss nonprofit Acurast expanded its smartphone-powered decentralized computing cloud network to show how more than 260,000 idle smartphones could provide processing power, reduce energy-heavy data centers dependency, and create a user-based market where people supply computing capacity.
The Swiss-founded decentralized physical infrastructure networks assembled the most geographically distributed compute layer, maybe in existence. The four-year old Zug-based company did so not through data center construction, or hyperscaler partnerships, but by converting idle consumer smartphones into an on-demand processing network spanning more than 175 countries.
For Acurast, the hardware already exists, already has power, and was otherwise doing nothing. The decentralized computing model can reuse processors inside old phones rather than requiring more server farms.
Idle Smartphones form a Shared Cloud
Founded in 2022, Acurast has processed more than 750 million on-chain transactions, as of April 2026, validating the network’s operational credibility beyond the proof-of-concept phase and into something that enterprise developers can build against with confidence.
Acurast’s model uses smartphone cloud computing, allowing unused devices to accept digital jobs. Owners who make their phones available receive tokens that can be used to buy capacity from the wider network.
Many phones are replaced despite having working processors. Acurast wants to give that hardware a second life.
The Swiss decentralized computing network inverts the conventional cloud economics that have made data center construction one of the most capital consuming categories in infrastructure investment worldwide.
The non-profit’s decentralized physical infrastructure networks (DePIN) rely on hardware supplied by many owners instead of equipment controlled by one cloud provider. Security is central to the system, so Acurast uses verifiable confidential computing to protect workloads.
Each device uses a Trusted Execution Environment, a protected area that separates the job from the owner and helps stop attackers from accessing its data. Companies can draw processing power from phones across locations instead of using one testing facility.
As of July, financial and on-chain governance metrics show that Acurast Association’s decentralized physical infrastructure networks have scaled to manage an active pool of over 260,000 idle and used smartphones.
Acurast is applying its decentralized computing system to cybersecurity testing with Swiss company Papers AG. Together, they are simulating distributed denial-of-service attacks to study how services respond when flooded with traffic.
User-Owned Market for AI, Robotics
Acurast Association’s expansion into peaq, the layer-1 blockchain built for the Economy of Things – or at least that’s what its backers call it – highlights how far the decentralized serverless cloud computing architecture has come.
The partnership pairs peaq’s machine identity infrastructure with Acurast’s network of processing nodes, allowing robots, autonomous vehicles, and other connected machines to tap mobile compute power directly, without routing through centralized web platforms.
Acurast compares its business model concept to Airbnb for computing. Through smartphone cloud computing, individuals offer unused processing capacity, while developers or companies pay only when a task needs to be completed.
A separate robotic.sh integration supports this wider vision. Robots running peaqOS can send a job to Acurast, pay for one deployment in USDC and receive a result without opening a traditional cloud account.
The integration follows a serverless cloud computing architecture because the machine does not need a permanent subscription or human-managed API key. Once the job ends, no unused service remains active.
On device AI smartphone inference could help robots analyze sensor data, images, or telemetry when their own computers cannot manage the workload. In one demonstration, three smartphones processed telemetry from a Unitree G1 humanoid, while peaqOS managed identity, payment and proof of completion.
A decentralized infrastructure network could later serve machines without forcing them to carry larger computers.
Acurast says the network may eventually support device AI smartphone inference for robotics, industrial systems and other AI tools outside traditional computing centers. By 2025, the company raised $11 million through grants and token-based rounds.
“TGE marks the moment Acurast becomes a genuinely open, global computer network ready for real-world integration. By turning idle phones into verifiable, confidential compute, we remove the gatekeepers and bring secure, trustless computation to anyone, anywhere,” said Founder, Alessandro De Carli, back in 2025.
For Acurast, decentralized computing means turning idle phones into shared infrastructure. If the network grows, smartphone cloud computing could offer secure processing on demand while users earn from hardware they already own.
The story remains centered on Acurast’s phone-powered security and compute network. The robotics example and 2025 funding only show how decentralized computing could develop into a wider market for AI and machines.
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