Muneeb Ali is the co-founder of the blockchain Stacks (formerly known as Blockstack) and the CEO of Hiro PBC, the company responsible for developing and maintaining the Stacks protocol.

Early Life & Education

Muneeb Ali was born in Pakistan to a military family. His father retired from the army and grew up in a village near Lahore where he had to walk long distances to attend school without electricity. Muneeb credits his upbringing for instilling a sense of gratitude and modesty in him. Growing up in Pakistan, he learned the importance of protecting wealth from rapid inflation and devaluation of the local currency, which his parents did by investing in assets like gold and property. These experiences have shaped his approach to his work, especially in the field of cryptocurrencies and decentralized finance. ^[1]

Ali earned a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and Mathematics from Lahore University of Management Sciences in 2003. He completed a Master of Arts in Computer Science from Princeton University in 2011, and a Doctor of Philosophy in Computer Science from the same institution in 2017. In 2014, Ali participated in the Y Combinator entrepreneurship program's Summer 2014 batch. ^[2]

Career

Ali began his career with a role as a Visiting Researcher at SICS in 2005, followed by a position as a Research Staff member at TU Delft from 2006 to 2008. In 2007, he was a Visiting Researcher at Stanford University, and from 2008 to 2010, he worked as an Assistant in Research at Princeton University which served as a basis for later work with blockchain technology.

From 2014 to 2016, Ali was the Co-founder and CTO of Onename, an early Bitcoin application that enabled decentralized names and profile pages. Lessons from building this app led to the design of Stacks in 2017.

Ali then returned to Princeton University, where he worked in the Networks and Systems group and also with the PlanetLab team, defending his Ph.D. thesis in 2017. From 2017 to 2021, Ali was the Co-founder and CEO of Hiro Systems, a company that builds developer tools for the decentralized Stacks ecosystem, with a mission to enable a user-owned internet on Bitcoin. In 2022, he transitioned to Chairman of the board at Hiro Systems, while also co-founding and becoming the CEO of Trust Machines. At Trust Machines, Ali is building upon the success of the decentralized Stacks project, enabling the largest ecosystem of Bitcoin applications and needed platform technologies. ^[3]

Stacks

Stacks is a Bitcoin layer for smart contracts, where users can create and build decentralized applications.

In 2013, while completing his Ph.D. at Princeton, Muneeb started working on what eventually became Stacks. Although his research at the time was not directly related to blockchain technology, the philosophies and practices he learned in academia influenced Stacks' development. Muneeb became increasingly interested in the potential of blockchain to create a truly decentralized internet and began focusing on decentralized identity and naming. He and his team realized that they could validate their ideas faster outside of academia by raising venture capital and immersing themselves in startup life. Muneeb took multiple leaves from his Ph.D. program to work on Stacks, eventually putting his degree on hold to pursue it full-time. The team published their work for peer review and comments, and the development of Stacks became Muneeb's own form of a thesis, enabling him to launch the project while completing his Ph.D. ^[4]

I view Bitcoin as the best, most decentralized money layer. That clearly means that there's demand for using Bitcoin in smart contracts... Instead of trying to bring Bitcoin in a wrapped fashion to some smart contract chain, why don't you bring the smart contract functionality directly to Bitcoin?

According to Ali, Stacks does not fit into the category of Layer 1 technologies like Bitcoin since it relies on smart contract functionality. It also cannot be considered a Layer 2 protocol such as Lightning. Ali refers to it as a Layer 1.5 technology. ^[5]

"For true Bitcoin DeFi, or true Bitcoin applications, you need to give them an experience where they're actually interacting with literal Bitcoin on the Bitcoin chain," he said. "And those are the type of applications that Stacks enables."

Nakamoto Upgrade

The Stacks network underwent a major upgrade called Nakamoto, which was finalized in October 2024. The upgrade significantly increased transaction speeds, allowing for confirmations in approximately five seconds. A key feature of the upgrade is that Stacks is now secured by 100% of Bitcoin's hash power, meaning transactions on Stacks achieve the same finality as transactions on the Bitcoin main chain. This upgrade was a foundational step for subsequent developments, including the launch of sBTC. ^{[6] [7]}

sBTC Launch

Following the Nakamoto upgrade, Stacks launched sBTC in early December 2024. sBTC is a token on the Stacks layer designed to be a trust-minimized, 1:1 pegged representation of Bitcoin. It allows Bitcoin to be used in smart contracts and DeFi applications without relying on centralized custodians, which is the case for other wrapped versions of Bitcoin like wBTC. Ali has described sBTC as a solution to Bitcoin's "write problem," enabling smart contracts to programmatically interact with Bitcoin. The project aims to make Bitcoin a more productive and programmable asset, unlocking its potential for a wider range of applications. The sBTC cap was expanded multiple times after its launch due to high demand, and plans were made to bring sBTC to other blockchains like Solana and Sui. ^{[8] [7] [9]}

Growth Strategy

In early 2025, Ali signaled a strategic shift for Stacks from a primary focus on product development to a more aggressive go-to-market and user acquisition phase. He changed his bio on X (formerly Twitter) to "war time founder @Stacks" to reflect this new orientation. This pivot was also supported by a draft proposal, SIP-031, aimed at creating a "Stacks Endowment" to fund and accelerate ecosystem growth, in part by increasing token emissions over a five-year period. ^{[6] [9]}

Views and Philosophy

On the Bitcoin L2 Ecosystem

In early 2025, Ali stated that the "honeymoon phase" for Bitcoin Layer 2 projects was over, predicting that the market is difficult and that more than two-thirds of existing projects would likely fail within three years as initial hype fades. He positioned Stacks as a "blue chip" project with a higher likelihood of long-term survival, noting that in risk-averse periods, investors tend to gravitate towards more established projects. ^[10]

On the Crypto Market

Ali has expressed strong confidence in Bitcoin, arguing it is one of the only crypto assets that attracts significant net new capital from outside the industry, particularly through instruments like spot Bitcoin ETFs. In contrast, he believes other crypto sectors often see the same capital rotating between different trends, such as from Layer 1 infrastructure projects to memecoins. ^[10]

He is a believer in Bitcoin's four-year halving cycles and has made bold price predictions based on them. In early 2025, he predicted that the Bitcoin price would not go below $50,000 again and could reach a peak of $150,000 to $200,000 by the end of 2025, viewing the cycle patterns as a "self-fulfilling prophecy" for large funds. ^{[6] [10]}

Vision for Bitcoin

A central part of Ali's vision is to onboard one billion users to the Bitcoin ecosystem. He argues that this scale is impossible to achieve on Bitcoin's Layer 1 alone, as the network cannot support that many users owning their own UTXOs (Unspent Transaction Outputs). He sees Layer 2 solutions like Stacks as essential for this goal, enabling mass adoption while preserving Bitcoin's core principles of decentralization and self-custody, rather than relying on custodial platforms like exchanges or ETFs. ^[6]

Interviews

Building Bitcoin’s Future: The Role of Stacks L2 #01

On May 12, 2025, Muneeb Ali took part in an interview on the TOKEN2049 YouTube channel during the Dubai edition of the conference, held on the KuCoin Stage.

In the discussion, Ali outlined his perspective on the development of Bitcoin, emphasizing its continued dominance in the market with an estimated share of around 65%. He described Bitcoin’s evolution from being regarded primarily as “digital gold” toward becoming a programmable financial platform. According to Ali, the main technical challenge for the industry has been enabling programmability and broader financial use cases for Bitcoin without undermining the security and simplicity of the base layer.

Ali referred to recent updates within Stacks (STX), a Layer 2 network connected to Bitcoin. Among them was the Nakamoto release, designed to allow near-instant transaction confirmations secured by Bitcoin’s hash power. He also mentioned sBTC, a 1:1 Bitcoin-backed token on the Stacks L2, which enables programmable and faster Bitcoin transactions. In his view, such mechanisms could make dormant Bitcoin capital accessible for decentralized finance applications.

He also noted the open participation model of the Stacks network, where individuals can act as validators, contributing to decentralization and network security. Ali pointed to what he described as a renewed focus on Bitcoin development, where concepts first tested in other ecosystems, such as Ethereum, are being adapted for use within Bitcoin’s security framework.

Finally, Ali highlighted ongoing research aimed at making Bitcoin’s use in Layer 2 environments more trustless, efficient, and programmable. He stated that this work is intended to support Bitcoin’s long-term role not only as a store of value but also as a foundation for decentralized financial systems. ^[11]

The Leather Lounge #02

On June 28, 2025, Muneeb Ali appeared in the final episode of The Leather Lounge, hosted by Sean Longstreet on the YouTube channel Leather. The discussion covered both the technical progress of the Stacks ecosystem and Ali’s personal reflections on leadership and work practices.

In the interview, Ali described his perspective on recent developments within Stacks, including SIP-31 and protocol upgrades such as Nakamoto and SPDC. According to him, these updates have improved transaction processing and user accessibility for applications built on Bitcoin. He explained that SIP-31 was designed as a framework to distribute resources across different sectors of the ecosystem, including decentralized finance, NFTs, and memecoins.

Ali outlined his long-term view of Stacks as infrastructure for expanding Bitcoin’s use in decentralized finance, payments, and related applications. He noted the relevance of self-custodial solutions, which, in his assessment, can lower counterparty risks and potentially support broader institutional adoption.

Beyond technical matters, Ali discussed personal routines that he considers helpful for maintaining focus and productivity, such as meditation, journaling, and rest. He also reflected on the balance between pursuing long-term innovation and aligning progress with current market readiness, noting the role of community feedback in shaping the project’s direction.

The conversation additionally touched on his interest in artificial intelligence. Ali compared the rise of AI with that of Bitcoin, observing both as transformative technological shifts. From his standpoint, a possible convergence of AI systems with Bitcoin infrastructure could emerge in the future, with Stacks positioned to play a role in that intersection. ^[12]