Pi Network Partners With Open Standard as OUSD Goes Live

Pi Network closed September with two simultaneous announcements: a formal partnership with Open Standard, the company powering a newly launched dollar stablecoin with institutional-grade backing, and a confirmed timeline for the Protocol 28 Mainnet upgrade. The two developments are separate — one is a business partnership in early stages, the other is a scheduled infrastructure upgrade with a hard deadline. Both arrived on the same day.

The official Pi Core Team announcement is at @PiCoreTeam on X.

The Open Standard Partnership — What Pi Announced

On September 30, 2026, the Pi Core Team announced that Pi Network is partnering with Open Standard — the company behind Open USD (OUSD), a partner-governed dollar stablecoin designed as open financial infrastructure.

Open Standard’s partner network now includes more than 200 organizations spanning payments, finance, technology, and crypto — including Visa, Google, Stripe, Mastercard, Coinbase, BlackRock, and Shopify, alongside major banks and payment processors.

According to the Pi Core Team, Pi will explore rewards programs for Pioneers and broader OUSD utility across the Pi ecosystem. No implementation details or rollout timeline have been published. The partnership is exploratory at this stage — Pi has not announced OUSD integration on Pi Mainnet, an exchange listing, or changes to Pi’s token supply.

OUSD — What the Stablecoin Is and What Went Live

OUSD went live on September 30, 2026. Businesses and developers can now mint, burn, and build with the stablecoin immediately.

OUSD is designed for banking, cross-border payments, settlement, institutional trading, and related use cases. It mints and redeems at a 1:1 USD conversion rate at no cost. Reserves are held at BlackRock, Lead Bank, and BNY — with monthly attestations published at reserves.bridge.xyz/ousd. OUSD is issued by Bridge, a Stripe company.

Building With OUSD — Live Integration Paths

Each path provides APIs for settlement, payment orchestration, FX, wallets, cards, and more.

OUSD Chains and Venues

OUSD is natively supported on Base, Ethereum, Solana, and Tempo — and is available on Coinbase, Kraken, and Uniswap at launch, with more venues planned.

Official contract addresses:

Partners earn rewards proportional to the supply and activity they drive — and have the opportunity to earn equity in Open Standard.

Why the Partnership Timing Matters

The Pi–Open Standard partnership is arriving as OUSD transitions from announced to live. Businesses can already build with the stablecoin today. Pi’s stated intention to explore Pioneer rewards and ecosystem utility is therefore connecting to an already-operational infrastructure layer — not a future product.

That distinction matters for how the partnership should be read. Pi has not committed to a specific OUSD integration, and no rollout date exists. What the Core Team has communicated is directional intent alongside a partner network that includes some of the largest names in global payments and institutional finance.

As covered in our Pi Network KYC and migration update fixing over 900,000 Pioneer blockers and Pi Desktop rename and SoloHost app rankings update, Pi has been progressively building out both its user-facing infrastructure and its developer ecosystem through 2026. The OUSD partnership is the first announcement that connects Pi’s ecosystem to an external stablecoin with institutional reserve backing and a live multi-chain deployment.

Protocol 28 — October 16 Mainnet Upgrade

The Protocol 28 timeline is separate from the Open Standard partnership and has a hard deadline.

Following the successful completion of the Protocol 27 upgrade on Pi Mainnet, Pi Testnet has already upgraded to Protocol 28. The Mainnet upgrade follows:

What Protocol 28 Changes

Delayed transaction data handling: Improved network behavior when transaction data arrives late — reducing edge cases that could affect block confirmation under load.

Batch smart contract upgrades: Developers can now upgrade groups of smart contracts simultaneously — reducing the complexity and risk of multi-contract application updates.

Safer stored-data changes: Protocol 28 makes it safer for developers to modify stored data as their applications evolve — a meaningful improvement for longer-lived applications on Pi Mainnet.

Protocol 28 does not change Pi’s token supply, confirm OUSD integration, or announce any exchange listing. It is a scheduled infrastructure step — the next in Pi’s sequential mandatory upgrade path.

Node operators must upgrade to Protocol 28 by October 13, 2026. Nodes not upgraded before the October 16 Mainnet activation will fall out of consensus.

What to Watch

Two open questions follow from today’s announcements:

On the OUSD partnership: When does Pi publish implementation details — specifically, what Pioneer rewards look like and how OUSD utility integrates across the Pi ecosystem? The partnership is confirmed. The mechanics are not yet public.

On Protocol 28: Node operators have until October 13. Whether the broader developer community begins building with Protocol 28’s batch upgrade and stored-data capabilities after October 16 will determine how quickly the infrastructure improvement translates into ecosystem-level impact.

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Written by

Nilesh Hembade

Nilesh Hembade is the Founder and Author of Coinsprobe, with 5+ years of experience in cryptocurrency and blockchain. Since launching the platform in 2023, he delivers daily, research-driven insights through market analysis, on-chain data, and technical research. His work has been featured on Binance, Bitget, and CoinMarketCap. He is also certified through Binance Academy (NFT Certificate).

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