Tag: Offchain Labs

Arbitrum Foundation and Fracton Ventures Ally to Boost Arbitrum Adoption in Japan

by Blockchain News

On September 29, 2023, the Arbitrum Foundation unveiled a significant strategic partnership with Fracton Ventures Co., Ltd., to broaden the horizons of Arbitrum scaling solutions in Japan. This joint venture, christened Arbitrum Japan, is geared towards enhancing blockchain technology adoption and spearheading the growth of the Arbitrum ecosystem within the Japanese domain.

The primary objective behind this strategic alliance is to expedite the expansion of the Arbitrum ecosystem in Japan and to proliferate the adoption of blockchain technology in the region. Arbitrum, acclaimed as a prominent Layer 2 scaling solution on the Ethereum blockchain, currently holds a commendable position with nearly 55% of the Total Value Locked (TVL) across Layer 2 chains.

Fracton Ventures, with its established reputation in Ethereum protocol development, will helm the inception of Arbitrum Japan. This endeavor is anticipated to galvanize consumer interest and developer involvement in the Arbitrum ecosystem. Moreover, the partnership aims to unlock new business prospects by capitalizing on Arbitrum’s superior scalability and security features, particularly in the realms of finance and entertainment.

In addition to business development, a significant focus of the alliance is to augment technical education and fortify the developer community within the region. A suite of activities including Ask Me Anything (AMA) sessions, hackathons, and other community-centric initiatives are slated to fast-track the comprehension and adoption of Arbitrum technology.

Established in March 2023, the Arbitrum Foundation has been steadfast in its mission to propel the Arbitrum network and its community forward, while cementing its position at the vanguard of blockchain adoption. The cornerstone of the foundation, Arbitrum One, conceived by Offchain Labs, emerges as a leading Layer-2 scaling solution for Ethereum, boasting over 54% TVL in the Layer 2 segment. With an extensive repertoire of more than 2000 DeFi and NFT projects thriving within its ecosystem, the Arbitrum Foundation continues its endeavor to provide robust scaling solutions for the Ethereum blockchain.

Nina Rong, Head of Ecosystem Development at The Arbitrum Foundation, articulated the immense untapped potential within the Japanese region. Through the collaboration with Fracton Ventures, she envisages a unique positioning to connect with a new demographic of developers, innovators, and blockchain-curious consumers who have not yet explored the advantages of blockchain technology and how Arbitrum has harnessed it to emerge as the leading Layer 2 scaling platform across the industry.

Siddharth Pillai, Head of Partnerships at Fracton Ventures, echoed similar sentiments. He emphasized that the partnership embodies an opportune moment to extend Arbitrum’s footprint in Japan, as the region is primed for innovation within the blockchain sector.

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Offchain Labs’s Arbitrum Stylus Goes Live

by Blockchain News

Offchain Labs announced the public testnet and code release for Arbitrum Stylus on August 31, 2023. This new framework is designed to work on Arbitrum Nitro chains, allowing developers to build smart contracts using both Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) tools and WebAssembly (WASM)-compatible languages like Rust, C, and C++. Stylus aims to significantly reduce gas costs and enable new, resource-intensive blockchain applications. The open-source Software Development Kit (SDK) is now available for developers.

One Chain, Multiple Languages

Arbitrum Stylus is designed to be a “one chain, many languages” solution. It allows developers to use traditional EVM languages like Solidity alongside WASM-compatible languages such as Rust, C, and C++. According to Offchain Labs, this feature expands the potential developer base from approximately 20,000 Solidity developers to millions who are proficient in Rust and C languages.

Efficiency and Cost-Effectiveness

Stylus claims to offer over 10x improvement in computational speed and over 100x improvement in memory efficiency compared to traditional EVM-based solutions. These efficiency gains are expected to translate into significantly lower gas costs for executing smart contracts. Offchain Labs states that allocating megabytes of RAM in Stylus could cost 100–500x less than in Solidity.

New Use Cases Enabled

The efficiency gains are not merely theoretical; they open doors to new blockchain applications that were previously impractical due to resource constraints. These include alternative signature schemes, larger generative art libraries, C++ based gaming, and compute-heavy AI models.

Security Features

Stylus also aims to improve smart contract security with features like opt-in reentrancy, a common vulnerability in Solidity that Stylus disables by default unless intentionally overridden by the developer.

Community and Ecosystem

Arbitrum, the Layer 2 scaling solution for which Stylus is built, already has a large developer and partner community. Stylus aims to leverage this existing ecosystem to encourage rapid adoption and innovation.

What’s Next?

Offchain Labs has scheduled a security audit of the Stylus source code by Trail of Bits. Additionally, a Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) vote will determine the inclusion of Stylus support in Arbitrum One and Arbitrum Nova. An “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) session is planned for September 7, 2023, and a Stylus Hackathon with $20,000 in bounties will be held at ETHGlobal NY from September 22–24, 2023.

Conclusion

The launch of Arbitrum Stylus marks a significant milestone in the evolution of Ethereum’s Layer 2 solutions. By offering multi-language support and efficiency gains, Stylus aims to broaden the developer base, reduce operational costs, and enable new blockchain applications. As the public testnet goes live, the blockchain community will be watching closely to see if Stylus delivers on its promises.

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Ethereum Layer-2 Offchain Labs Raises $120M Led by Lightspeed Venture Partners

by Blockchain News

Offchain Labs raised $120 million led by Lightspeed Venture Partners in its Series B financing Tuesday, aiming to expand Ethereum contracts to meet the growing demand for Ethereum transactions.

Other investors include Polychain Capital, Ribbit Capital, Redpoint Ventures, Pantera Capital, Alameda Research, Mark Cuban, etc., participating in this financing.

Offchain Labs stated that it would use the funds raised to further develop the “Optimistic Rollup” extension solution Arbitrum for layer 2 of Ethereum.

As part of the financing agreement, Lightspeed’s co-founder Ravi Mhatre also joined the company’s board of directors.

Another Partner at Lightspeed, Amy Wu, responded to this investment:

“Their dedication to the Ethereum developer community is second to none and they have the best, easiest-to-use scalability product. That’s why over 400 projects have chosen to launch with Arbitrum, including Reddit.”

Arbitrum One is a layer 2 ecosystem based on the Ethereum network officially launched by Offchain Labs in May, supporting users to trade at extremely low prices.

At present, some DEFI protocols based on Ethereum, including Aave, MakerDAO, Chainlink, and Uniswap, have been built on Arbitrum One.

“We are excited to partner with our investors who understand the importance of scaling Ethereum and bringing the Ethereum ecosystem to the masses. The tremendous support we’ve seen from developers across the globe validates our mission to be the first to marry the world of FinTech and Defi,” the Co-founder and CEO of Offchain Labs, Steven Goldfeder, says.

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Offchain Labs launches Arbitrum One mainnet, secures $120M in funding

by Cointelegraph

Offchain Labs, the team behind the highly anticipated Ethereum layer two platform, Arbitrum One, has completed the public mainnet launch of its optimistic rollups solution.

Announced on Aug. 31, Offchain Labs also revealed that it has secured $120 million in a Series B fundraising round. The round was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and also saw participation from heavyweight crypto investors Polychain Capital, Pantera Capital, Alameda Research and Mark Cuban.

Lightspeed partner Ravi Mhatre also joined Offchain Labs’ board as part of the round. Amy Wu, also a partner at Lightspeed, stated:

“[Offchain Labs’] dedication to the Ethereum developer community is second to none and they have the best, easiest-to-use scalability product. That’s why over 400 projects have chosen to launch with Arbitrum, including Reddit.”

In May, Offchain Labs, completed its beta launch of Arbitrum One for developers, allowing developers to begin building on the platform.

Many leading DeFi protocols are already building on Arbitrum One, including Aave, MakerDAO, Chainlink, and Uniswap. Last month, popular social media network Reddit also announced it will launch its own layer-two rollup based on Arbitrum’s technology.

Offchain Labs are not alone in pushing to scale Ethereum, with rival rollups solution Optimism onboarding developers in recent weeks, while the total value locked (TVL) in decentralized finance protocols on the Polygon sidechain appears to have found a floor at $5 billion since the recent crypto downtrend.

Related: Chainlink launches data oracles on Arbitrum One’s Ethereum scaling solution

Arbitrum One’s public launch comes as gas fees have been persistently high on the Ethereum mainnet as a result of the surging popularity of nonfungible tokens (NFTs).

According to Etherscan, average gas prices have exceeded 100 gwei over the past week, with regular token transfers costing more than $7 while transactions using decentralized exchanges exceed $65 on average. By contrast, gas prices were just 15 gwei one year ago.