Epics DAO Solana Validator Reaches Top 10 in Shinobi Performance Pool — Score 99.91, Rank 9, Accelerating ERPC SWQoS Quality

ERPC, operated by ELSOUL LABO B.V. (Amsterdam) and Validators DAO, announces that the Epics DAO Validator — the core node powering ERPC's SWQoS endpoints — has achieved Top 10 placement (rank 9, score 99.91) in the Shinobi Performance Pool, a performance-based Solana staking pool.

Since announcing Top 20 entry (score 99.80) on March 13, the validator has climbed approximately 10 positions in just 9 days. The next targets are Top 5, Top 3, and ultimately the top position.

Validator address: EpicsoqLdDP8qRn3wQRKTSKAXbjK9dUgFfNPRQS77MQD Staking page: https://epics.dev/en/staking/

At the time of the Top 20 announcement last week, the score stood at 99.80. As of today, it has risen to 99.91, reaching rank 9.

This growth is not the result of a single major initiative. It reflects the cumulative effect of daily tuning across every layer — hardware, OS kernel, network stack, and runtime configuration. As individual optimizations interact with one another, they produce gains that no single measure could achieve alone.

Top 10 is still a waypoint. We will continue improving toward Top 5, Top 3, and the top position.

Solana's network is composed of high-performance validators. The speed and reliability of the entire blockchain depend on each validator operating at peak performance.

ELSOUL LABO has conducted continuous research and development over the past two years to push Solana's scalability and speed to their limits. Epics DAO, Validators DAO, and ERPC are an ecosystem that emerged from this accumulated R&D, evolving through mutual knowledge exchange. All of these efforts are reflected in the current operation of ERPC and the Epics DAO Validator.

High-performance validator operation is directly linked to high-performance Solana RPC operation. Insights gained from validator optimization are applied to improve ERPC's Solana RPC nodes, and challenges discovered in ERPC's Solana RPC operations feed back into validator tuning.

By understanding the precise role of each node and applying optimizations tailored to its function, individual improvements drive system-wide optimization. This cycle is the structure that simultaneously elevates the validator's score and ERPC's quality.

The Shinobi Performance Pool is a staking pool that allocates stake based on on-chain performance metrics. From thousands of validators worldwide, it automatically selects the top approximately 50–60 based on performance metrics and ranks them accordingly.

The evaluation criteria span skip rate, average vote latency, Compute Units per block, vote inclusion status, APY, and more. Commission rates, advertising spend, and other external factors have no influence on ranking. Performance itself is the sole evaluation axis.

Being consistently selected into this group is itself proof of high-performance validator status. Achieving Top 10 within it demonstrates a world-class performance level under the Shinobi Performance Pool's evaluation criteria.

Shinobi Pool Performance Ranking: https://xshin.fi/#Validators

Stake-weighted Quality of Service (SWQoS) is Solana's priority communication mechanism. Nodes with stake connections gain access to priority lanes, and stake volume directly determines priority bandwidth.

The Epics DAO Validator currently holds over 200,000 SOL in active stake, supporting the priority bandwidth of ERPC's SWQoS endpoints. Improvements in validator performance are directly reflected in SWQoS endpoint quality.

Going forward, we are targeting 300K SOL and ultimately 500K SOL, pursuing both stake growth and performance improvement simultaneously.

Validator improvements reach users through ERPC. ERPC integrates Solana RPC, Solana Geyser gRPC, Solana Shredstream, bare metal servers, and VPS within a single platform. SWQoS-powered transaction submission, real-time gRPC stream reception, and fastest-available Shreds data retrieval are co-located in close proximity. This architecture ensures that validator-side performance gains are readily reflected across submission, reception, and stream processing.

A high-performance Solana RPC and validator operating environment is already available. Combined with one-command environment setup, operation, backup, and migration through the open-source tool SLV, we will continue to comprehensively support our customers' high-speed environments.

Epics DAO is a project dedicated to the sustainability of open-source development, having built open-source tools including solv — the predecessor to SLV for Solana validator and Solana RPC bootstrapping. Validators DAO is a community born from Epics DAO's focused commitment to Solana development and now co-operates ERPC. Validator operation, infrastructure R&D, open-source tool development, and developer support — these are not separate activities but interconnected within the Epics DAO and Validators DAO ecosystem. Buidlers Collective (BDLC) serves as the pathway for open-source developers and Solana Buidlers to access ERPC's full-stack connectivity within this cycle.

BDLC GENESIS is a limited-edition community NFT of 1,000 units. While held, holders receive the Bundle Standard plan — valued at €698/month — providing full-stack access to Solana RPC, Solana Geyser gRPC, and Solana Shredstream (Direct Shreds) at no cost.

When validator quality improves, ERPC quality improves. When ERPC quality improves, the infrastructure value that BDLC holders receive improves. This chain is the design philosophy of the ecosystem built jointly by Epics DAO and Validators DAO.

Buidlers Collective NFT Marketplace (Magic Eden): https://magiceden.io/marketplace/buidlersc

ELSOUL LABO has been approved under the Dutch government's WBSO R&D support program every year since 2022, marking five consecutive years. The continuous research and development in Solana RPC infrastructure, validator placement and operational orchestration, and automation tooling has been recognized, and the initiatives of Epics DAO, Validators DAO, and ERPC have emerged from this accumulated body of work.

The validator's Top 10 achievement is evidence that two years of research and development are bearing fruit. Additionally, the launch of a Solana-specialized data center under our own ASN (AS200261) is underway, with preparations advancing for the next stage in both validator and infrastructure capabilities.

The Epics DAO Validator operates under a policy that balances performance pursuit with maximum staker returns. It adopts a 0% staking commission and 0% MEV fee policy, maximizing incentives for stakers while reinvesting earned revenue into network performance improvements and research and development.

We are deeply grateful for your continued support and engagement. The real-world operational feedback from our users has sharpened both our improvement priorities and validation accuracy.

We will continue building an environment worthy of our customers' high-performance application development and operation.

Thank you as always.

This article is not intended as investment advice. Staking, LSTs, and related services carry inherent risks. Please conduct your own research before making any decisions (NFA / DYOR).