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Healing the Rift: Aave founder Stani Kulechov has pledged to share non-protocol revenue (generated outside the core lending code) with AAVE token holders.
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Frontend Friction: The proposal follows a community dispute over Aave Labs’ decision to redirect interface fees away from the DAO treasury.
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RWA Strategy: Kulechov is pushing for Aave to expand into Real-World Assets (RWAs) and institutional lending to grow beyond its current crypto-native use cases.
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Branding Resolution: The new plan includes a "branding assets" structure, potentially addressing demands for the DAO to own the Aave intellectual property.
Balancing Innovation with Decentralized Governance
The tension between the original R&D firm (Aave Labs) and the governing cooperative (Aave DAO) reached a breaking point in late 2025 over the ownership of "off-protocol" fees. Kulechov’s latest post serves as an olive branch, arguing that for Aave to reach its next phase—supporting institutional and consumer-facing models—the incentives of the developers and the token holders must be perfectly aligned. He suggests that independent teams should be encouraged to build "opinionated" products on top of the Aave Protocol, provided the value ultimately flows back to the AAVE token.
The Future of Aave IP
Beyond revenue, the "branding" component of the proposal is a major concession. Token holders have long argued that the Aave brand itself should be a DAO asset rather than the property of a private firm. By committing to a formal proposal on branding and revenue structures, Aave Labs is attempting to create a sustainable "L1-style" ecosystem where the core protocol captures upside through increased global usage, while the DAO maintains the "North Star" of the brand’s integrity.
