SAIHM — Sovereign AI Horizontal Memory on Filecoin

# Open Grant Proposal: SAIHM — Sovereign AI Horizontal Memory on Filecoin

## Project Overview

| Field | Details |
| :--- | :--- |
| **Project Name** | SAIHM (Sovereign AI Horizontal Memory) |
| **Proposal Category** | Developer and data tooling |
| **Individual or Entity Name** | **Russell Jackson, LLC**, operating the SAIHM Project. If a natural-person counterparty is required instead of the LLC, that can be arranged in private correspondence following review. |
| **Proposer (GitHub)** | [SAIHM-Admin](https://github.com/SAIHM-Admin) |
| **Project Repo(s)** | [SAIHM-Admin/saihm-mcp](https://github.com/SAIHM-Admin/saihm-mcp) (published MCP server, Apache-2.0). Core protocol lives in a private monorepo today; the published surface is the production-grade MCP server other agents consume. |
| **Filecoin Ecosystem Affiliations** | None. SAIHM is an independent open-source project. The project uses `@filoz/synapse-sdk` v0.41.0 (FWSS / PDP) as its live Filecoin storage tier on Filecoin Mainnet, funded with USDFC and FIL acquired via Squid Router v2 from native USDC. No prior business or contractual relationship with Protocol Labs, Filecoin Foundation, FFDW, or any PL Network entity. |
| **Technical Sponsor** | None (no prior discussion). The team welcomes a sponsor introduction during review. |
| **Open Source License Agreement** | **Yes**, the SAIHM Project agrees to open source all grant-funded work under the MIT/Apache-2.0 dual license. The existing protocol surface is already Apache-2.0. |

---

## Project Summary

**SAIHM (Sovereign AI Horizontal Memory)** is a production-grade memory protocol for AI agents. It is the first AI memory system that treats decentralized storage as a first-class compliance substrate rather than as an experimental sidecar: Filecoin (via the Synapse SDK / PDP / FWSS stack) is SAIHM's live ciphertext tier on mainnet today, and the protocol's right-to-erasure mechanism is specifically designed around Filecoin's CID-blacklist capability — a property that distinguishes Filecoin from permanent-storage alternatives like Arweave for any AI memory workload that must comply with GDPR Article 17, CCPA, or HIPAA.

The protocol surfaces eight Model Context Protocol (MCP) tools — `saihm_remember`, `saihm_recall`, `saihm_forget`, `saihm_status`, `saihm_share`, `saihm_revoke_share`, `saihm_governance_propose`, `saihm_governance_vote` — that any MCP-capable AI agent (Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, Continue, custom MCP clients) can call. Each cell write produces a Filecoin storage commitment + an on-chain anchor on COTI V2 mainnet, giving auditors a tamper-evident timeline they can verify against the public ledger without trusting the operator. Today the project has ~23,000+ shards live and ~92 MB stored on Filecoin via the Synapse rail, with the OpenSSF Best Practices Passing badge (project 12898) and an active outreach surface at https://saihm.coti.global.

This grant funds the work that turns SAIHM's Filecoin integration into a reusable reference architecture for the entire AI-agent ecosystem: hardening the Synapse-tier path to multi-SP fanout, extracting the GDPR-compliant Filecoin storage primitives into a standalone library other Filecoin-adjacent projects can adopt, building a standalone MCP↔Filecoin bridge that lets any AI agent (not just SAIHM users) use Filecoin as its memory store, and seeding the Filecoin ecosystem's presence in the rapidly-emerging AI agent infrastructure conversation.

---

## Impact

### Solving the AI-memory compliance gap with Filecoin specifically

Every AI agent that handles user data hits the same wall today: vendor-hosted memory cannot survive the vendor, cannot prove erasure to a regulator, and cannot move with the user to a different model. The default fix — "store agent state in a vector database" — does not solve any of those problems; it just changes which custodian holds the data. The principled fix is to put encrypted memory on decentralized storage and to anchor the audit trail on a public ledger. But every decentralized-storage option has a compliance objection, and most fail it:

- **Arweave** is structurally incompatible with GDPR Article 17 right-to-erasure: the network's incentive model is designed *not* to forget, and there is no CID-blacklist mechanism. An EU-regulated AI deployment cannot legally use Arweave for any data that might later need to be erased.
- **IPFS-only** (without a Filecoin storage layer) provides no durability guarantee, no economic incentive for pinners, and no formal erasure pathway.
- **Custodial S3/GCS/Azure** reintroduces the very vendor-lock-in problem decentralized storage was supposed to fix.

**Filecoin is the only mainstream decentralized-storage substrate that supports the full SAIHM compliance pattern:** content-addressed durable storage + economic incentive for SPs + a working CID-blacklist mechanism that, paired with cryptographic key destruction, produces a regulator-verifiable erasure receipt. SAIHM has already proven this pattern works in production on Filecoin Mainnet via Synapse / FWSS / PDP. This grant takes that proof-of-concept and turns it into infrastructure other teams can adopt directly.

### Why this is urgent for the Filecoin ecosystem

AI agents are the largest emerging buyer of persistent, durable, verifiable storage. Every AI memory product shipping in 2026 — Claude's Auto Dream and Managed Agent memory, OpenAI's persistent memory, Anthropic's Skills, and every MCP-stack startup — needs a storage substrate. Most of them will default to whatever their vendor offers. **If Filecoin captures the AI-memory workload during the substrate-selection window that is open right now, the network gains a high-volume, high-durability, high-paying class of users for the next decade.** If it does not, the workload will lock into custodial or Arweave-like solutions and Filecoin's path to that market closes.

SAIHM is the demonstration that this works, the open-source reference architecture other projects can copy, and the MCP-stack bridge that makes Filecoin the path-of-least-resistance choice for any agent developer who reads our docs.

### Risk of not getting this right

The AI-memory substrate decision is being made by hundreds of projects in the next 12 months. Once an agent vendor commits to a storage backend, they do not switch. The window to position Filecoin as the default substrate for AI memory closes before end-of-2026. Without funded work to extract SAIHM's Filecoin patterns into reusable infrastructure and to evangelize that infrastructure into the MCP / Claude / Cursor / Windsurf developer audience, the substrate decision will be made on inertia, not on Filecoin's technical merits.

---

## Outcomes

The deliverables fall into three reusable artifacts plus an ecosystem-outreach surface:

1. **Production-hardened Synapse FILECOIN tier** in SAIHM, with multi-SP fanout, retrieval latency benchmarks, and a public storage-economics dashboard so operators can plan FIL/USDFC budgets.
2. **`@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage`** — a standalone Apache-2.0 library, usable by *any* Filecoin project, that bundles the SAIHM patterns: client-side encryption with wallet-derived keys, Synapse-SDK storage put/get, CID-blacklist on key destruction, on-chain tombstone format, and audit-receipt verification. Other Filecoin projects can adopt it without depending on SAIHM the protocol.
3. **`mcp-filecoin-bridge`** — a standalone Model Context Protocol server (Apache-2.0) that exposes Filecoin storage as MCP tools (`filecoin_store`, `filecoin_retrieve`, `filecoin_forget`) to any MCP-capable agent. Installable via `npx`, configurable in seconds, works with Claude Code / Cursor / Windsurf / any MCP client. This is the path of least resistance for an AI agent developer to use Filecoin.
4. **Ecosystem outreach**: case studies, integration guides, developer tutorials, and a Filecoin-track presence at AI/MCP developer events (FilDev, FilOz, MCP conferences, AI Engineer summit). Public traction metrics: data-onboarded volume, downstream-project integrations, MCP-bridge `npx` install count.

### Success metrics

- **Filecoin data onboarded as a direct result of this work:** see Data Onboarding table below.
- **Downstream Filecoin-compliant-storage library adopters:** ≥3 distinct external projects integrate the library within 6 months of M2 completion.
- **MCP-bridge install count:** ≥250 `npx` invocations from ≥75 distinct IPs in the first 90 days post-M3 release.
- **Multi-SP fanout:** SAIHM cells distributed across ≥3 distinct Filecoin SPs by end of M1; retrieval-success rate ≥99.5% measured over a 30-day rolling window.
- **Public visibility (all written / async surfaces):** ≥5 in-depth technical blog posts published on the SAIHM project site, ≥3 guest posts on partner publications (developer journals, MCP-ecosystem newsletters, Filecoin-ecosystem outlets), ≥2 long-form text Q&A interviews published on third-party developer media, and ≥10 in-depth async community engagements (GitHub Discussions, Reddit, HN, Mastodon, MCP Discord) tied to grant-period topics.

---

## Data Onboarding

| Timeframe | Projected Filecoin Volume | Context |
| :--- | :--- | :--- |
| **Today (baseline)** | ~92 MB across ~23,000 cells | Production usage via Synapse SDK / PDP / FWSS on Filecoin Mainnet. |
| **Month 1** | 250–400 MB | M1 production-hardening drives cell volume from active SAIHM operators; multi-SP fanout duplicates per-cell footprint across providers (improves retrieval, increases stored bytes). |
| **Month 3** | 2–4 GB | `@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` library released (M2). Early external adopters (3–5 projects) begin routing storage through the library, with Filecoin as the default Synapse-backed tier. |
| **Month 6** | 10–20 GB | `mcp-filecoin-bridge` released (M3) brings AI-agent operators onto Filecoin without requiring SAIHM. Enterprise pilots driven by GDPR/AI Act compliance push begin onboarding production datasets. |
| **Month 12** | 40–80 GB cumulative + sustained per-month growth | Ecosystem outreach (M4) drives the library and bridge into the broader MCP / AI agent developer community. Per-month growth rate exceeds cumulative, reflecting the network-effect inflection. |

These projections are conservative; they assume only direct downstream adoption of SAIHM-grant artifacts and exclude indirect ecosystem growth (other AI memory projects forking the patterns, vendor-side integration with managed agent platforms, etc.).

---

## Adoption, Reach, and Growth Strategies

### Target audience (three concentric rings)

1. **Inner ring — AI agent developers using MCP.** This is the largest, fastest-growing developer audience for the AI substrate decision right now. Reachable via: the public `awesome-mcp-servers` listing, MCP-specific subreddits and Discord servers, dev.to / Hashnode / Qiita technical blogs, Claude/Cursor/Windsurf community forums. SAIHM is already published in the MCP ecosystem (`@saihm/mcp-server`) and has an active outreach surface at https://saihm.coti.global with 7+ technical blog posts, sitemap-indexed and SEO-optimized.
2. **Middle ring — Filecoin-ecosystem builders looking for AI-workload exposure.** Reachable via FilDev, FilOz, the devgrants repo itself, Synapse-SDK community, and PDP / FWSS developer channels. Goal: get the `@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` library into ≥3 Filecoin-adjacent projects within 6 months.
3. **Outer ring — CISO / DPO / compliance-driven enterprise buyers.** Reachable via the SAIHM compliance-track blog corpus (already published: "AI memory needs a standard", "Cryptographic erasure: how SAIHM makes AI memory forget for real", "Where AI memory lives", others). This audience does not yet know they want Filecoin storage; they know they want GDPR-compliant AI memory, and the SAIHM materials position Filecoin as the answer.

### Engagement plan

- **Existing outreach pipeline.** The SAIHM project already operates a config-driven engagement-drafter pipeline targeting venue-specific AI/MCP/storage threads. Grant deliverables and case studies will be deep-linked into that pipeline (subject to standing brand-discipline rules on substrate references). The pipeline currently has 7 indexed blogs in the catalog.
- **Direct developer outreach.** Personal-quality replies on Hacker News, Reddit `/r/LocalLLaMA` / `/r/ClaudeAI` / `/r/MachineLearning`, Mastodon AI dev communities, and the MCP Discord — targeting threads where someone is asking how to persist agent memory.
- **Written content surface (all async, no live appearances).** The SAIHM Project's outreach posture is written-only: long-form technical blogs on the project site, guest posts on partner publications, written/text-based interviews, expanded integration documentation. This is a deliberate choice — written content compounds in search and citation over time, scales to a global audience without travel or scheduling, and the SAIHM project site is already established as the canonical content surface (7 blogs published as of grant submission, sitemap-indexed). The substrate-explainer blog already exists as a base reference for the Filecoin-substrate argument.
- **`npx` installability.** Both `@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` and `mcp-filecoin-bridge` will be designed for one-command installation, removing the friction that kills most decentralized-storage adoption attempts.

---

## Development Roadmap

The work is structured into four milestones over approximately 6 months. The team is small (solo architect + LLM-assisted engineering loop, with budget allocation to hire a Filecoin-specialist contractor for the storage-economics dashboard and SP-fanout work in M1).

### Milestone 1 — Production Hardening of the Synapse FILECOIN Tier

- **Goal:** Take SAIHM's existing Synapse-SDK FILECOIN tier from "live on mainnet" to "production-defensible at 10× current volume."
- **Key actions:**
- Multi-SP fanout: every cell stored across ≥3 distinct Filecoin SPs with deterministic retrieval-priority logic. Failure-mode tests for SP downtime / deal-expiry.
- Retrieval latency benchmarks: instrumented end-to-end timing for the `saihm_recall` path, public dashboard (under `/status` on saihm.coti.global) with rolling 7-day percentiles.
- Storage-economics dashboard: live FIL / USDFC burn-rate per cell, projected runway under different volume scenarios, surfaced as both an in-app and public-facing page so operators can budget.
- Synapse-SDK security review: static analysis on the SAIHM-side adapter, with an external Filecoin-storage-specialist service engagement for an independent read.
- **Functionality after completion:** Production-grade multi-SP storage with measurable reliability, public economics transparency, and an independently-reviewed integration surface.
- **Team:** Solo architect (lead). Budget includes provision for an external security-review service engagement (~30h equivalent) sourced from the Filecoin storage-specialist community.
- **Funding required:** **$12,000 USD**
- **Timeframe:** 4–6 weeks

### Milestone 2 — `@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` (standalone library)

- **Goal:** Extract the SAIHM Filecoin-storage compliance patterns into a reusable Apache-2.0 library that any Filecoin project can adopt independent of SAIHM.
- **Key actions:**
- Library surface design: minimal API (`put`, `get`, `forget`, `verifyTombstone`, `verifyReceipt`) with TypeScript types and JSDoc.
- Wallet-derived encryption-key generation (HKDF chain), Synapse-SDK storage put/get with multi-SP fanout, CID-blacklist on key destruction, on-chain tombstone format (substrate-agnostic — works with any anchor chain), audit-receipt verification.
- Comprehensive unit + integration test suite running against Filecoin Mainnet.
- Documentation: README, integration guide, two worked example apps (one MCP-side, one non-MCP-side).
- Published to npm with semantic-version commitment.
- **Functionality after completion:** A drop-in dependency for any Filecoin project that needs GDPR-compliant, audit-anchored storage, with no requirement to adopt SAIHM the protocol.
- **Team:** Solo architect (lead).
- **Funding required:** **$13,000 USD**
- **Timeframe:** 6–8 weeks

### Milestone 3 — `mcp-filecoin-bridge` (standalone MCP server)

- **Goal:** Ship a standalone Model Context Protocol server that exposes Filecoin storage as MCP tools, installable in seconds by any AI-agent developer (Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, Continue, custom MCP clients).
- **Key actions:**
- MCP-tool design: `filecoin_store(content, opts) → CID`, `filecoin_retrieve(CID) → content`, `filecoin_forget(CID) → tombstone`, `filecoin_status() → tier + economics`.
- Backend: `@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` (the M2 deliverable) — eats our own dogfood.
- Configuration: zero-config default (auto-derived wallet, sensible defaults), opt-in advanced config for SP selection / multi-SP / custom encryption.
- Distribution: `npx mcp-filecoin-bridge` works out of the box. Listed in `awesome-mcp-servers`. Published in the MCP server registry.
- Documentation: integration recipes for each major MCP client (Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf), with copy-paste config snippets.
- **Functionality after completion:** An AI-agent developer who has never touched Filecoin can have Filecoin-backed memory in their agent in under 10 minutes.
- **Team:** Solo architect (lead).
- **Funding required:** **$12,000 USD**
- **Timeframe:** 6–8 weeks

### Milestone 4 — Ecosystem Outreach & Reference Adoption

- **Goal:** Drive measurable downstream adoption + public visibility for the M1–M3 artifacts.
- **Key actions (all written / async / from-home):**
- Case studies: 3 deep-dive written write-ups of external projects adopting the library or bridge, published on the SAIHM project site and submitted as guest content to Filecoin-ecosystem publications.
- Long-form technical content: ≥5 in-depth blog posts on the project site (architecture, economics, GDPR-on-Filecoin pattern, MCP-integration recipes, library/bridge HOWTOs).
- Guest publications: ≥3 long-form guest posts on partner developer publications (dev.to, Hashnode, Qiita, Filecoin-ecosystem newsletters, MCP-ecosystem newsletters).
- Written Q&A interviews: ≥2 long-form text-based interviews published on third-party developer media.
- Async community engagement: ≥10 substantive written engagements on GitHub Discussions / Reddit / HN / Mastodon / MCP Discord channels tied to grant-period topics — text-only, no live formats.
- Library / bridge growth metrics: public dashboard tracking npm downloads, `npx` invocations, downstream project integrations.
- **Functionality after completion:** Measurable downstream adoption with traction metrics; SAIHM and its artifacts established as the canonical AI-memory-on-Filecoin reference.
- **Team:** Solo architect (lead). Budget includes provision for content-distribution and community-management service engagements as needed.
- **Funding required:** **$8,000 USD**
- **Timeframe:** 4–6 weeks (overlaps with M3 tail)

---

## Total Budget Requested

| Milestone | Description | Deliverables | Completion Date (approx.) | Funding |
| :---: | :--- | :--- | :--- | :---: |
| 1 | Production-harden Synapse FILECOIN tier | Multi-SP fanout, latency dashboard, economics dashboard, security review | T+6 weeks | **$12,000** |
| 2 | `@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` library | Apache-2.0 npm package + tests + docs + 2 example apps | T+14 weeks | **$13,000** |
| 3 | `mcp-filecoin-bridge` standalone MCP server | npm package, `awesome-mcp-servers` listing, MCP-client integration recipes | T+22 weeks | **$12,000** |
| 4 | Ecosystem outreach + reference adoption | 3 written case studies, ≥5 in-depth blogs, ≥3 guest posts, ≥2 written interviews, ≥10 async community engagements, traction dashboard | T+26 weeks | **$8,000** |
| | | | **Total** | **$45,000 USD** |

The $5,000 headroom below the $50K cap is deliberate: it reserves room for the Filecoin Foundation reviewer to suggest a fifth milestone or scope addition during review without re-negotiating the cap.

---

## Maintenance and Upgrade Plans

The SAIHM Project commits to maintain the grant-funded artifacts for at least **12 months** post-final-milestone, covering:

- Security patches on `@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` and `mcp-filecoin-bridge` within 72 hours of disclosure for critical, 14 days for high, 30 days for medium severity.
- Synapse-SDK version-bump compatibility within 30 days of upstream releases.
- Issue triage on both repos (`@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` and `mcp-filecoin-bridge`) with target first-response time ≤72 hours.
- A public maintenance status page (`/status` on saihm.coti.global, already live for SAIHM the protocol — same surface extended).

Beyond the 12-month commitment, the project is sustained by:

- The existing SAIHM mainnet operating revenue (early-stage; planned ramp via the broader SAIHM commercialization).
- Continued integration with the standards bodies SAIHM is engaged with (IETF ISE submission in pipeline, W3C CG proposal phase, OpenSSF Best Practices Passing badge held since 2026-05-19).
- Community contribution: both artifacts will accept external contributions under a published CONTRIBUTING.md.

---

# Team

## Team Members

| Name | Role | Links |
| :--- | :--- | :--- |
| SAIHM Project (operated via Russell Jackson, LLC) | Founder, lead architect, sole maintainer | [GitHub](https://github.com/SAIHM-Admin) · [Project site](https://saihm.coti.global) · [Published MCP server](https://github.com/SAIHM-Admin/saihm-mcp) |

The project is operated as a sole-architect open-source effort. Where milestone work calls for specialized external review (e.g., the security-review component of M1, or content-distribution work in M4), the grant budget includes provision to engage those services on a contract basis from the Filecoin storage-specialist community and the broader open-source-tooling community. Service engagements are paid for specific deliverables and do not constitute team membership.

## Relevant Experience

The SAIHM Project is operated by a single architect with primary responsibility for design, implementation, deployment, and operation. Public artifacts demonstrating capability:

- **Live deployment on Filecoin Mainnet.** SAIHM's FILECOIN tier currently holds ~92 MB across ~23,000+ shards via `@filoz/synapse-sdk` v0.41.0 (FWSS / PDP). End-to-end write+read byte-equality verified. Cross-chain funding flow operating via Squid Router v2 from Base USDC → Filecoin USDFC + FIL.
- **Substantial existing codebase.** SAIHM the protocol implements: 8 MCP tools, an HKDF identity chain (MPS-PQC-KEY-GEN-v1 → MPS-AGENT-IDENTITY-v1), a GC-3 destroyDek pipeline for GDPR Article 17, a CID-blacklist mechanism, an on-chain tombstone format, and a GC-14 audit trail. The protocol is published as `@saihm/mcp-server` on npm and has been operating in production on COTI V2 mainnet.
- **OpenSSF Best Practices Passing badge** (project 12898, achieved 2026-05-19).
- **Standards engagement.** IETF ISE draft accepted into pipeline 2026-05-18 (draft-saihm-memory-protocol-00, Informational). W3C AI Agent Memory Interop Community Group proposal in supporter-gathering phase. NIST AI RMF / ISO/IEC 27001 / EU AI Act / GDPR Art.17 / MCP crosswalks published.
- **Public technical writing.** Seven in-depth technical blogs published at https://saihm.coti.global covering memory architecture, cryptographic erasure, the AI-memory-standard gap, the context-window problem, polymorphous cell shape, the substrate-selection question, and the AI / MCP / Filecoin intersection.
- **Independent project.** No prior business or contractual affiliation with Protocol Labs Network entities. Apache-2.0 licensing. Independence notice published on every page of the project site.

### Why this team for this work

The project has already done the load-bearing engineering of integrating Filecoin into a production AI memory protocol. The grant funds extraction of that work into reusable infrastructure and ecosystem outreach. The hard problem (does this even work in production on Filecoin Mainnet?) is solved. The grant funds the productization and the ecosystem distribution.

## Team Code Repositories

- [SAIHM-Admin/saihm-mcp](https://github.com/SAIHM-Admin/saihm-mcp) — published Model Context Protocol server, Apache-2.0
- Forthcoming grant-funded repos: `SAIHM-Admin/filecoin-compliant-storage` (M2), `SAIHM-Admin/mcp-filecoin-bridge` (M3) — will be created upon grant approval and developed publicly throughout the milestone period.

---

# Additional Information

- **How did you learn about the Open Grants Program?** Direct research on Filecoin Foundation funding programs as part of the SAIHM Project's standards-and-ecosystem campaign.
- **Best email for grant agreement and next steps:** `architect@saihm.coti.global` (role mailbox monitored by the architect).
- **Additional context that may help evaluation:**
- The substrate-explainer blog (https://saihm.coti.global/blog/2026-05-21-where-ai-memory-lives) documents the engineering reasoning for choosing Filecoin (vs Arweave, vs custodial, vs L1-only) — useful pre-read for the review committee.
- The cryptographic-erasure blog (https://saihm.coti.global/blog/2026-05-21-cryptographic-erasure-ai-memory) details the GDPR Article 17 mechanism that motivates the `@saihm/filecoin-compliant-storage` library and explains why Filecoin's CID-blacklist capability is load-bearing for the AI memory compliance story.
- The project's outreach surface (https://saihm.coti.global) is live and indexable; the team is responsive on the role mailbox.
- All three grant-funded artifacts (M1 hardening, M2 library, M3 bridge) are designed to function and benefit the Filecoin ecosystem **even if SAIHM the protocol does not gain adoption**. The library and bridge stand alone as Filecoin contributions; SAIHM is merely the first consumer.

---

*Submitted by the SAIHM Project under the Filecoin Foundation Open Grants Program. The SAIHM Project commits to the Apache-2.0 / MIT dual-license requirement for all grant-funded work and accepts the grant program's standard reporting and milestone-acceptance terms.*