Blockchain project Aptos has announced the launch of the mainnet on October 17. As of October 19, the own token is to be launched on major exchanges such as Coinbase, FTX and Binance. The very ambitious project was launched by ex-developers Diems (formerly Libra) after the Facebook stablecoin was mothballed.
The project was able to raise over US$300 million from investors such as Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), FTX Ventures, and Coinbase Ventures. The project is currently estimated at around four billion US dollars.
Aptos aims to replace Solana as a “high-speed” blockchain. The finished blockchain is expected to reach up to 160,000 transactions per second, three times faster than Solana at its best. But the most recent startup has been less compelling and leaves questions unanswered.
Darling of venture capital?
Aptos enjoys an ambivalent reputation. It’s not just Facebook’s past that sticks stubbornly to the project. It is also said that there is a great danger that small investors will become big investors as cannon fodder for profit taking when the APT token goes public. Aptos was financed almost exclusively by solvent venture capital. It is therefore often blasphemously referred to in the crypto industry as “VC darling”, i.e. “venture capital darling”. So far, there has been no public sale.
In this context, it is suspicious that important information about the token distribution was unknown until shortly before the start. Of course, big crypto exchanges, some of which are investors themselves, still want to run the trendy token.
In the meantime, the project has released a summary of its token distribution (tokenomics). About half of the tokens have already been allocated to internal projects to promote the ecosystem, the rest belongs to said investors and the team itself.
82% of the entire supply has already been staked. An artificial scarcity of tokens is common in new blockchain projects. The resulting price increase initially creates euphoria before further tokens are released after a few months and significantly dilute the supply.
Next-gen blockchain?
So far, however, Aptos hasn’t been deterred by the reviews. It is said that tokenomics was designed with the community in mind. The blockchain works “as expected” after day one according to the Twitter channel of the project.
Aptos was founded by Mo Shaikh and Avery Ching, who previously worked on Diem. What wasn’t possible with Facebook’s failed project should now succeed with Aptos. The team wants to apply its many years of experience in the classic technology industry to Web 3.0 and create the “most secure and scalable Layer 1 blockchain”.
A new approach to blockchain programming should make this possible. “Parallel Execution” is the name of the transaction processing type, which is expected to allow up to 160,000 executions per second. In addition to this, the new programming language “Move” would make it easier for all developers to work and poach them from Solana or Ethereum.
At first, however, there was apparently little to see. According to one user, the block explorer had only four transactions per second (TPS). It would be slower than Bitcoin.
According to Paradigm Engineer, it was also questionable that Aptos disabled its Discord servers right before the start, which prevented users from communicating with the team. A “necessary step” to protect the community from scammers like Aptos complaints.
According to the developers, the initially low transaction speed is only a consequence of the still low level of activity on the blockchain. It’s normal shortly after the start, according to a Discord message. With increased use, the speed should also increase.
Marketing or mass adaptation?
As always, it’s worth noting that it won’t be clear until later if Aptos is truly in competition with Solana or if enthusiasm is waning as quickly as past “blockchain revolutions.” Memories are awakened of the long before publicized and more than failed launch of the “Internet Computer Protocol” (ICP).
The Aptos blockchain may still lack the necessary maturity. After almost four years of development, it’s hard to speak of a rushed launch. But the claim that the launch seems premature would not be without merit. Because the competitor “Mysten Labs” is currently in the final phase of development of its blockchain called “Sui”.
This project also has former meta-developers on its team and works with the Move programming language. It is possible that Aptos will rush to position itself as a pioneer with an earlier start. At the expense of broader functionality.
Either way, both projects will need to prove themselves in the existing blockchain and crypto community. Aptos’ adaptation should show in the coming weeks and months whether Facebook’s former developers have really solved the blockchain trilemma or are just using their marketing experience for themselves.
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