The majority of the current blockchain networks suffer from problems of low scalability, high transaction fees, and slow time of processing, therefore preventing mass adoption and resulting in the eventual lowering of their prospects for decentralized applications (dApps). This creates bottleneck situations, especially at the time of high demand, which leads to congestion and inefficiency.
This next-generation Layer 1 platform is based on the latest consensus mechanisms and cutting-edge architecture to provide faster transaction processing, lower fees, and seamless user experiences.
In essence, SONIC uses a new consensus algorithm that enhances transaction per second, along with lowering latency. This helps the network to accommodate thousands of transactions with very marginal delays, making it responsive and effective at all times.
An optimized fee structure that reduces financial barriers for users and developers lessens transaction costs. This way, SONIC makes it cheaper for firing transactions and deploy dApps, hence driving towards an all-inclusive and more accessible blockchain ecosystem.
It provides a sturdy suite of tools and resources for developers, which includes many others: complete SDKs, APIs, and documentation. These are some of the resources that make creation and dApp development and deployment much easier. Another critical aspect in SONIC’s architecture is interoperability, in which, of course, there is no hitch in the process of integrating any other blockchain network or any legacy system. This adds to its versatility and makes it more convenient.
Security is also a very critical goal for SONIC. It provides for integrity and reliability in the network by advanced cryptographic techniques and stringent security protocols in protection against vulnerabilities and attacks.
In a nutshell, the new SONIC Layer 1 blockchain solves the trilemma of scalability, high costs, and complexity facing existing networks. Being high performance, low cost, and developer-friendly sets SONIC apart as a move toward broadening blockchain adoption and innovation, opening up endless opportunities and discovery of new decentralized app and service horizons.
Fantom is decentralized Layer 1 blockchain platform, and it’s soon to be launching the new and innovative platform under the brand of Sonic. The article summarizes what Fantom is and covers the features that it may offer; the upgrade of Sonic launches later this year.
What Is Fantom?
Fantom is a Layer 1, fully decentralized platform built to solve the scalability challenges presently faced by blockchain systems like Bitcoin and Ethereum. Fantom claims that, due to the Lachesis protocol, transactions, on average, cost less than $0.01 and can settle in less than a second, since the platform can process many tasks in parallel. Fantom was founded in early 2018 by Dr. Ahn Byung Ik, a computer scientist from South Korea, and advisor Matthew Hur. It was created out of frustration with the pace at which Ethereum was upgrading and developing a fast, cheap, scalable platform.
The current leadership of the Fantom Foundation includes CEO and Director Michael Kong, Executive Chairman David Richardson, Core Contributor and Director Andre Cronje, CTO Quan Nguyen, Chief Marketing Executive Joe Epstein, and Chief Research Officer Professor Bernhard Scholz. To date, the foundation has raised over $91 million in multiple funding rounds, including a further $10 million toward the Sonic Foundation.
The Technology Driving Fantom
At the core of Fantom’s technology lies the Lachesis protocol, designed to be fast and efficient. One of the hallmarks of asynchronous validation, the Lachesis protocol independently allows various validating parties to validate transactions without having to wait for a certain block to be added and finalized. That is made possible through directed acyclic graphs—non-linear data structures where connections only move in one direction—thus enabling multiple blocks to be added simultaneously for faster transaction times.
The validators have a “block DAG” of their own, where every transaction is independently verified before syncing with other nodes to reach final consensus. Blockchains play a role in the final consensus by ordering and including blocks verified across a majority of validators in the main chain.
Fantom’s Ecosystem
At the moment, by mid-2024, Fantom’s ecosystem holds upwards of $100 million in TVL. Top protocols, including Beethoven X, SpookySwap, and Equalizer, amount to more than 70% of this. Fantom averages daily transactions amounting to about 250,000. Both metrics, though, stay much below their historical highs.
Fantom just announced its native stablecoin, USDC.e. The stablecoin minted by Wormhole is bridged from native USDC on Ethereum; possible future upgrades to native USDC are imperative for a successful DeFi ecosystem.
What is Sonic?
The most anticipated event for Fantom this year would definitely be the release of Sonic, a brand new layer-1 platform chained to Ethereum via a custom-made layer-2 bridge. Sonic’s target is a mashup of Fantom’s low costs, scalability, and velocity with Ethereum’s economic security and liquidity. Sonic sports a brand-new EVM-compatible Fantom Virtual Machine, improved storage, an optimized Lachesis consensus—targeting more than 2,000 TPS with less than a second of finality.
Sonic’s technology has been deployed on the Fantom Opera chain in a demonstration of capability. Sonic also features two testnets, one closed for public observation and an open one for user interaction. In the existing smart contracts, services, and tools on Fantom Opera would work natively with Sonic once it has gone live. The establishment would be including the establishment of a Sonic Foundation, Sonic Labs, and a native token S at launch.
FTM and S Token
The native token of Fantom, FTM, has been in use for payments, governance, and as rewards to validators. It features a maximum supply of 3.175 billion tokens with a circulating supply of over 2.8 billion. Hence, users will find their FTM tokens replaced with S on a 1:1 basis. The Fantom token, FTM, would be first swappable back and forth with S and then one-way migration. Although the official tokenomics of S have not been released yet, by some future proposals, it would be noted that it would play a role in the airdrop programs, growth initiatives, and validator rewards.
