By
Bena Ilyas
April 22nd, 2024
Matter Labs said that 150 projects have showed the intent to integrate zkSync technology as part of scaling the Ethereum mainnet.
On Wednesday, November 16, Matter Labs announced securing a fresh fundraise of $200 million which they will use for building the Ethereum scaling solution zkSync.
This Series C funding round was co-led by Blockchain Capital and Dragonfly. Other investors such as a16z, Variant, and LightSpeed ventures also joined the investment round. Investment giants such as Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) have contributed even during the Series B funding round.
Over the last few years, many players have been working on building Ethereum scaling solutions. Matter Labs uses a technical approach dubbed zkSync to scale the Ethereum mainnet. Here, “zk” means that the technology uses zero-knowledge proof for reducing the data footprint on the Ethereum blockchain. However, it doesn’t compromise on the matter of security and network decentralization.
Besides, the “zk” technology also uses “roll-ups” to batch and bundle transactions off the Ethereum mainnet and improve the network efficiency. The most important thing is that all zkSync roll-ups will be EVM compatible, meaning, they can work with any blockchain using the Ethereum Virtual Machine. Some of the popular examples of EVM-compatible blockchains include Polygon, Solana, Avalanche, and Binance Smart Chain.
Matter Labs said that the developers who have built projects on Ethereum can quickly turn to zkSync for their scaling needs. As per the MIT Open Source Initiative, Matter Labs would be open-sourcing all of its code. Speaking to Decrypt, chief product officer at Matter Labs Steve Newcomb said:
“Anything other than full open-source, is censorship of code, censorship of ideas, and censorship of innovation. We are going to MIT Open Source every last bit of all the important aspects in our mainnet, so that we protect all three of those freedoms.”
Faster Adoption of Ethereum Scaling Solution zkSync
Matter Labs said that several projects in the decentralized finance (DeFi) space are already looking to integrate zkSync.
Newcomb said: “We have 150 launch partners. We can include in that launch partner list Chainlink, SushiSwap, Uniswap, Maker, 1inch, Gnosis, and Wintermute. I can keep going, it’s basically everybody.”
Popular lending and borrowing platform Aave is looking to deploy on zkSync’s testnet earlier this November. Additionally, other players such as MakerDAO, Uniswap, and SushiSwap are also looking for similar implementation in February.
Matter Labs has disclosed its roadmap with a three-phase roll-out. They are currently in the first phase meaning that the network is technically closed as it still continues to conduct different tests. However, the team is expecting a complete roll-out to users by the end of 2022 or by early 2023.
During the second phase dubbed “Fair Launch Alpha,” a staggering 150 projects have shown the intent in porting to zkSync.
Unlike the competitors like Optimism, Matter Labs said that they are not hurrying for a token launch. “We are not in a hurry to do the token. There’s a trilemma that exists in decentralization: the trilemma of decentralizing your organization, decentralizing your technology, and decentralizing your economy. The token is only one part of this. And we want to make sure we handle that trilemma really, really well,” added Newcomb.