Moonbeam Network Completes Launch With Cross-Chain Capabilities & New Features On Polkadot
Dubbed the “future of multichain,” Moonbeam Network, the fully EVM-compatible platform, has completed its launch process on Polkadot. Developed by PureStake, one of the leading API service and blockchain infrastructure providers, Moonbeam is among the most highly anticipated projects of 2022.
Earlier in 2021, the Moonbeam team participated and won a slot in the Kusama parachain slot auctions. Moonbeam’s canary network Moonriver secured the second Kusama slot by raising upwards of 205,000 KSM from more than 10,000 contributors. After winning the second slot of the ongoing Polkadot parachain auctions by collecting almost 38.5 million DOT from more than 200,000 contributors through its crowdloan initiative, Moonbeam launched as a “parachain” on December 17, 2021. To put the figures in perspective, Moonbeam’s crowdloan had both the largest number of contributors and the highest amount of DOT received by any parachain on Polkadot to date.
Following this, the Moonbeam development team started adding the decentralization feature and new collators and removed the Sudo key, thereby successfully concluding its launch process. The Moonbeam Network, live on Polkadot since January 11, 2022, has etched its name in history as the first fully operational parachain on the Polkadot network, enabling more than 80 projects in the Moonbeam ecosystem to begin deployment. As part of the launch, a number of infrastructure projects are expected to be deployed by the Moonbeam development team in the coming days, including bridges, multisignature support, and oracle integrations, among others.
Besides support for ECDSA signatures and Ethereum H160 accounts, Moonbeam is always enhancing its interoperability, highlighted by its most recent embrace of EIP-1559, or the Ethereum London hard fork. This Ethereum proposal shifted network fees and the mechanisms responsible for setting them. The newfound support for EIP-1559, which is already live on Moonriver after a runtime 1201 upgrade, means that Moonbeam projects and developers have the building blocks available to reflect these new realities. This change will be reflected in Moonbeam on February 18th.
Additionally, the Moonbeam team has also rolled out native cross-chain capabilities on its canary net Moonriver. Through this upgrade, Moonbeam introduced the XC-20s on the Kusama network, Polkadot’s canary net. The XC-20 is a new type of interoperable token standard that is Substrate-native and conforms to the ERC-20 standard.
Simplifying Cross-Chain Dapp Development
By design, Moonbeam is a developer-friendly blockchain platform that enables developers to migrate their existing Ethereum-based dApps to Polkadot easily. The platform leverages Polkadot's built-in capabilities such as on-chain governance, staking, and cross-chain integrations to expand Ethereum's base functionality further. By virtue of being a parachain on the Polkadot network, Moonbeam will also benefit from the shared security and integrations with other parachains connected to Polkadot.
The platform makes it easy for developers to integrate their existing dApps with other individual chains like Bitcoin and Ethereum. Developers can quickly build applications that integrate directly with users and assets on remote chains using Moonbeam smart contracts and the Ethereum developer toolset, either through native Polkadot compatibility or bridge-based integrations. Moreover, Moonbeam supports Solidity smart contracts, allowing developers to swiftly move current projects to the network with minimal code changes.
Owing to the promising features offered by Moonbeam, especially ease-of-use, a myriad of projects have already begun employing its interface to build state-of-the-art dApps. As a faster and more cost-efficient alternative to Ethereum, Moonbeam is now home to more than 80 dApps, spanning DeFi, NFT, P2E games, and several other growing blockchain spaces.
Currently, the total value locked (TVL) in the Moonbeam Network is $187.66 million, and that of Moonriver is $152.77 million, making them the largest ecosystems within both the Polkadot and Kusama networks. Since then, the network has expanded quickly, securing the ninth slot in the list of Top 10 Fastest-Growing Ecosystems With 50+ Developers compiled earlier this month by Electric Capital.
A consortium of promising projects like StellaSwap, BeamSwap, Zenlink, Solarflare, PadSwap, ThorusFi, Synapse, Pickle, Astral Finance, and Connext are already live on Moonbeam, while dozens more are ready to deploy. Moonriver and Moonbeam ecosystem projects include APIs and tools like Multichain, Remix, SubQuery, Moonscan (Etherscan), DappLooker, Magic Link, Figment, and Automata Witness, EthSign, Mars, Waffles, OpenZeppelin, API3, The Graph, and many more.
Other than this, assets and issuance projects like My Wish, Impossible Finance, Ocean Protocol, AllianceBlock, AMPnet, Poolz, and Polimec by KILT Protocol, DeFi Zircon Finance, Nomad, RomeDAO, QiDAO, Unilend, DOT.Finance, Beefy.Finance, Lido, DODO, C.R.E.A.M Finance, NFT platforms like Moonbeans, NFTrade, Banksea, RMRK, myNFT, oracles like Chainlink, Band Protocol, DIA, and Razor, and a ton of other parachains, storage, explorers, bridges, and P2E games are also under construction atop the Moonbeam platform.
Moonbeam is backed by some of the biggest names within the industry, like Arrington Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Fenbushi Capital, Signum Capital, GBV, Hypersphere Ventures, Parafi Capital, and many more, helping it forge forward as one of the most promising blockchain ecosystems designed to support a diverse range of use cases.
Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
Cudos Sponsored DeFi Live Event is Underway, Featuring the Greatest Minds From the Blokchain
DeFi Live is underway, one of the most hotly awaited expos for the entire blockchain, DeFi, Metaverse realm. It is a place to meet, engage with like minded individuals, share knowledge, meet investors. And hear from some of the most insightful thought leaders and players in the industry.
The event, which is taking place in London now until the end of the day, at the Kensington Conference & Event Centre and virtually through Brella.io is one not to miss. You can buy tickets here. The events sponsor this year is Cudos Partners, a decentralized and sustainable cloud computing network that is bridging the world’s of the cloud and the blockchain.
The Cudos Network merges its L1 infrastructure with a L2 computation and oracle network, which gives users and developers the ability to compute at scale, leveraging hundreds of thousands of nodes, and counting. Kudos is working towards interoperability across all leading Layer 1 networks, including Ethereum, Algorand, Polkadot, and Cosmos.
The CEO and Founder of Cudos, Matt Hawkins will be delivering a keynote speech, about how to power the Metaverse through the blockchain today at 3.20pm at the conference and through the virtual gateway.
The Future of NFTs and DeFi
Other keynote speakers will be exploring The Future of NFT’s, The Renaissance of Money in DeFi and How DeFi can Make the Leap to Institutions. The event is expecting more than 700 attendees, over 100 speakers and a virtual audience of over 2000 visitors.
The landmark event will be followed by a closing party at the glamorous Arboretum club in Charing Cross, which will offer a further opportunity to network with the brightest minds and leading lights in the industry.
There will be a plethora of panel discussions taking place over the day from the likes of Bitcoin Pioneers, The Bigger Pie, Coinscrum, and Net Zero Capital, as well as Cudos partner API3 DAO, who allows users to create trustless applications that interact with web APIs. If you can’t make the event but would nevertheless like to hear from Ben Carvill, about how to feed data into the blockchain, you can listen here.
Cudos Matt Hawkins said of the event, “As far as inaugural events go, DeFi Live has to be one of the most hotly anticipated events of 2021, and we are champing at the bit to converse with 1000’s of like-minded innovators, investors and enthusiasts. Don’t let the name fool you. This event will span the crypto sphere with NFTs and Metaverse also taking centre stage.”
Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.