Every year, newcomers flood into the layer one (L1) blockchain arena, aiming to surpass established giants like Ethereum (ETH) and Solana (SOL).
While many stumble and fade away, there’s a palpable air of anticipation surrounding one standout: Monad.
With the weighty backing of influential crypto venture capital firms like Paradigm and Dragonfly Capital, Monad is poised to revolutionize the L1 landscape. It’s engineering a powerhouse L1 chain set to achieve a staggering 10,000 transactions per second (TPS), leveraging the finest attributes of Ethereum and Solana.
Curious about Monad’s secrets to achieving such unprecedented network throughput? Stay tuned as we unveil all below.
Key Takeaways:
- Monad Labs has garnered support from investors like Dragonfly Capital, Paradigm, Coinbase Ventures, Wintermute Ventures, and others.
- Monad aims to enhance the EVM engine by implementing a transaction execution system inspired by Solana.
- Monad Labs has not yet made an official announcement regarding the MONAD token airdrop.
- Nevertheless, Monad has initiated a campaign titled “The Monad Social Credit Score,” designed to incentivize Discord activity participation with XP rewards.
- The launch of the Monad mainnet is anticipated later this year.
What Is Monad?
Monad, a cutting-edge Ethereum virtual machine (EVM)-compatible L1 blockchain, revolutionizes the landscape with its capacity for parallel execution.
Powered by the visionary team at Monad Labs, headquartered in the heart of New York City, led by the dynamic trio of Keone Hon, James Hunsaker, and Eunice Giarta, with Hon at the helm as CEO.
In February 2023, Monad Labs boldly announced securing a formidable $19 million seed round, spearheaded by Dragonfly Capital. This injection of capital propels their mission to redefine the EVM L1 sphere with fundamental enhancements to both consensus and execution protocols.
Fast forward to mid-March 2024, and Monad makes waves with the launch of its devnet, a dynamic preview of the Monad L1, setting the stage for a paradigm shift in blockchain technology.
April 2024 marks another monumental stride for Monad Labs as they unveil a staggering $225 million funding round, led by the prestigious Paradigm. Notable participants include Electric Capital, Animoca Ventures, Bankless Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, and Wintermute Ventures, affirming the industry’s recognition of Monad’s transformative potential.
Among Monad’s esteemed angel investors stand luminaries such as crypto luminary Eric Wall, Wormhole co-founder Robinson Burkey, LayerZero co-founder Bryan Pellegrino, Pudgy Penguins NFT trailblazer Luca Netz, and crypto maven Inversebrah, underscoring the widespread confidence in Monad’s trajectory toward unparalleled success.
Why Create Monad When We’ve Got Ethereum and Solana?
Monad stands as the pinnacle of blockchain innovation, meticulously crafted to seamlessly integrate with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), the unparalleled powerhouse in smart contract computing. As of April 12, 2024, data from DefiLlama unequivocally asserts EVM’s dominance, commanding nearly 90% of the total value locked (TVL) across all blockchain platforms.
The widespread adoption of EVM has solidified its status as the gold standard, renowned for its battle-tested reliability, and hence, an obvious choice for pioneering blockchain endeavors. Nevertheless, the burgeoning demand for crypto services highlights a glaring need for enhanced throughput capabilities within EVM-based chains.
Critiques directed at Ethereum’s sluggish throughput, hovering around 14 transactions per second (TPS), and exorbitant gas fees reverberate throughout the industry, exposing a pressing necessity for optimization. While alternatives such as Avalanche (AVAX), BNB Chain (BNB), and Polygon (MATIC) demonstrate superior throughput compared to Ethereum, their performance still falls short of the high-performance benchmarks that Monad sets out to achieve.
Chainspect data underscores this fact, with BNB Chain boasting a maximum recorded TPS of 2,222, Polygon at 649 TPS, and Avalanche at 92 TPS. Monad’s ambitious goal of achieving 10,000 TPS through “deep optimizations” in EVM transaction processing signifies a quantum leap in blockchain scalability. Furthermore, Monad sets its sights on an unprecedented network throughput of approximately 40,000 TPS, epitomizing a paradigm shift in blockchain performance.
In contrast to Solana’s approach of developing a proprietary virtual machine (VM) known as Solana Virtual Machine (SVM), Monad champions a collaborative ethos, seeking to harness the expansive EVM ecosystem’s capital and expertise. By leveraging the widespread popularity of the EVM engine, Monad envisions a harmonious synergy between its blockchain and the thriving EVM-compatible landscape, propelling the crypto industry towards global scalability and adoption.
How Will Monad Achieve 10,000 TPS?
Monad is set to revolutionize transaction processing within its EVM model with the introduction of a cutting-edge system: parallel execution. Departing from the current sequential execution method utilized by EVM engines, Monad asserts that this sequential approach serves as a bottleneck, limiting transaction throughput to one at a time.
In the forthcoming parallel execution system, the blockchain will dynamically identify and execute independent transactions simultaneously, vastly improving efficiency. Transactions with shared dependencies will be intelligently scheduled for consecutive execution, ensuring seamless processing.
Monad explained: “A simple token transfer between two parties affects no one else. But transactions interacting with the same smart contract can change the state and therefore cannot execute in parallel. For example, an AMM swap could be routed through multiple pools, and all pools involved cannot process other transactions until the first is done.”
Solana has boldly pioneered the introduction of a parallel execution system dubbed Sealevel. Yet, in its quest to implement this groundbreaking scalability upgrade through a new VM, Solana has positioned itself in a solitary stance.
Monad, on the other hand, aims for the pinnacle, seeking a fusion of EVM compatibility alongside the remarkable parallel execution capabilities reminiscent of Solana’s prowess.
Monad Token Airdrop: What We Know So Far
As of April 12, 2024, Monad Labs has yet to make an official announcement regarding a MONAD airdrop. However, given the necessity of a native token for gas payment on L1 blockchains, it’s a logical inference that a MONAD token will soon be introduced.
Notably, Monad has initiated the “Monad Social Credit Score” campaign on Discord, designed to incentivize participation through XP rewards. Speculation among airdrop enthusiasts suggests that this XP system may tie into the distribution of the MONAD token.
Emphasizing the value of community engagement, Monad’s Discord administrators are committed to recognizing and rewarding contributors across platforms. Members receive distinct roles based on their level of involvement and contributions, fostering a culture of recognition and appreciation.
Moreover, Monad plans to offer NFTs through special events and competitions, providing additional incentives for community engagement.
Cryptunez, a member of Monad’s ecosystem marketing team, underscores the importance of quality contribution over mere participation. In the Monad community, meaningful engagement is paramount, reflecting the ethos of fairness and meritocracy.
With the recent launch of its devnet in March 2024, Monad is poised to deploy its mainnet later this year, typically signaling the commencement of airdrop activities.
The Bottom Line
Monad boldly enters the blockchain arena poised to disrupt Ethereum’s reign as the premier smart contract platform.
With an ambitious pledge to achieve over 10,000 transactions per second (TPS), Monad’s potential is electrifying. However, history has taught us that scalability in blockchains often demands compromises, forcing choices between security, decentralization, and speed.
The question lingers: What path will Monad choose? Only time will unveil the answer.