Aave co-founder accuses Kamino of "poor imitation" of Aave, Solana co-founder refutes

Odaily News Aave’s dominance in the DeFi lending space appears to be facing stiff competition. According to data compiled by Token Terminal, Solana on-chain DeFi project Kamino has seen a 1,368% increase in net deposits since January 2024, while Morpho has seen a 214% increase in net deposits during the same period. Meanwhile, Aave’s net deposit growth rate is about 213%.
This week, Aave founder Stani Kulechov criticized Kamino on X and argued that the project was a "copycat" of Aave's "old technology" with a "half-baked" user interface. His post sparked a rebuttal from Solana community members, including Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko, who argued that Kamino is better. Marc Zeller, another early member of the Aave development team, has also been critical of other DeFi projects' practices when they run into problems.
Although Kulechov criticized Kamino, he admitted in a recent podcast: “In general, the more developers on the chain, the better, it doesn’t matter where they start or end. I would be happier if Solana had more developers building resilient, safe, and secure DeFi.” (Bloomberg)