By Riley Kaminer
ETH is up 86% year to date, BTC is up 159.36%. Is it safe to say we’re ‘back’ yet? Today’s news coming from Miami web3 startup Versatus is yet another supporting data point.
The company announced that it has raised a $2.3 million seed round at a $50 million valuation. There was no single group leading the round, which included participation from NGC Ventures, Republic Crypto, and Hyperithm.
Originally founded as VRRB Labs, Versatus raised a $1.4 million pre-seed in February on the idea of building a Layer 1 blockchain network. Founder and CEO Andrew Smith told The Block that the company scrapped those ideas due to a lack of market demand.
Now the company has pivoted toward developing what’s called “stateless rollup technology” – a type of Layer-2 scaling solution that aims to address the scalability limitations of Layer-1 blockchains like Ethereum.
Confused? Let’s break it down. Imagine you’re trying to organize a large event. You need to keep track of a lot of information, such as who is attending, where they’re sitting, and what they’re eating. One way to do this is to have a central database that all the volunteers can access. This can be a bit inefficient, though, as everyone has to constantly update the same information.
A better solution would be to use a decentralized system. In this system, each volunteer would have their own copy of the information. This would allow them to update their own records without having to worry about everyone else.
Stateless rollup technology is a bit like that. It’s a way of making blockchains more efficient by decentralizing the storage of data. Instead of having all the data stored on every node in the network, it’s stored on a smaller number of specialized nodes. This can make it faster and cheaper to use the blockchain, and it can also make it more resistant to censorship.
As stateless rollup technology matures, it is expected to play an increasingly important role in the future of blockchain technology. By enabling more efficient and scalable blockchains, stateless rollups can make blockchain technology more accessible to a wider audience.
Versatus’s LASR platform makes it easy for developers to create applications that use stateless rollup technology. This could have a lot of applications, such as making it easier to trade cryptocurrencies, or to create decentralized applications that are more efficient and secure.
Specifically in the context of Ethereum, the rails Versatus is currently focused on, Smith shared that Versatus hopes to reduce, “cost and inefficiencies of Ethereum, eliminate the friction and centralization associated with optimistic rollups, all while delivering a 100x better developer experience.”
At the moment, LASR is in a test phase, with plans to launch on the Ethereum testnet in the first week of January ahead of a full launch in mid-March. Versatus currently has 15 employees.
Before founding Versatus, Smith co-founded OWL ESG, an environmental social and governance data provider.
READ MORE IN REFRESH MIAMI:
If you enjoy our free content, please support us by becoming a paid member
Refresh Miami is a 501c3 non-profit with a mission to educate, inspire, connect and grow South Florida’s tech and startup ecosystem.
Versatus raises $2.3M seed round to reduce the cost and inefficiencies of Ethereum – Refresh Miami
all41author
– Advertisement –
