In the ever-changing world of blockchain technology, MultiversX is at the forefront of driving innovation and scalability. Leading this groundbreaking project is Beniamin Mincu, the CEO and Co-founder of MultiversX. Recognized as a prominent figure in the Web3 space, Beniamin’s visionary leadership has positioned MultiversX as a top-tier Layer 1 blockchain solution. The company is renowned for its state sharding technology, robust security features, and energy-efficient operations.
With a mission to empower entrepreneurs, developers, enterprises, and government officials, MultiversX is focused on creating a transparent and collaborative framework that fosters radical innovation. The platform boasts an impressive capacity of handling 263,000 transactions per second and has a thriving ecosystem of over 8,200 dApps and 3,200 nodes, showcasing its commitment to scalability and efficiency.
Before founding MultiversX, Beniamin played a crucial role in shaping the blockchain investment landscape through his work at Metachain Capital. He supported pioneering projects like Polkadot, Binance, and Tezos, leveraging his extensive experience and strategic insights to drive MultiversX towards its ambitious goals.
In this exclusive interview, Beniamin Mincu shares insights into MultiversX’s mission, the development and impact of Sovereign Chains, and the future of blockchain technology. From utilizing state sharding for unprecedented transaction speeds to addressing technical challenges and enhancing security, Beniamin provides a comprehensive overview of how MultiversX is setting new benchmarks in the blockchain industry.
Q1. Can you provide a brief overview of MultiversX and its mission in the blockchain space?
MultiversX leverages highly scalable, secure, and efficient blockchain technology to create a collaborative framework and composable toolkit for stakeholders such as entrepreneurs, developers, enterprises, and government officials. The company’s goal is to enable transparent and radical innovation, allowing anyone to seamlessly create, augment, and interconnect applications, networks, and systems at scale in a distributed and interoperable manner.
MultiversX pioneered state sharding technology in the Web3 space and has introduced future-proof features like meta-transactions, native tokenization standards, and on-chain 2FA protection. The platform is carbon-negative and energy-efficient, supporting an extremely high transaction volume of 2.5 billion daily capacity with low latency and negligible costs.
Q2. What inspired the development of Sovereign Chains, and how does it fit into MultiversX’s long-term vision?
The development of Sovereign Chains was inspired by the need to surpass the experience of legacy technologies and provide great usability and an intuitive development framework. Sovereign Chains extend the capabilities of general-purpose blockchains by offering a customizable and scalable architecture to build on. It creates a unified Web3 ecosystem that surpasses current centralized options.
Sovereign Chains mirror what MultiversX has already achieved by providing a stable, reliable, efficient, and powerful foundation for Web3 builders. The vision remains the same, but this time it is extended to the entire crypto space.
Q3. How does Sovereign Chains leverage sharding technology to achieve up to 70,000 transactions per second?
Sovereign Chains are built on top of MultiversX, benefiting from the robust technology already developed. This eliminates resource sharing with other apps on the same shard, significantly increasing throughput and eliminating bottlenecks. Extensive configuration options have been provided to Sovereign Chains.
Through hardcore engineering, a new consensus mechanism, a new state trie model, a new execution way, and the spaceVM, Sovereign Chains achieve a faster block time of just 1 second and 2 seconds finality. This outperforms the current setup and most benchmarks from other Layer 2 solutions. During a live demo, the efficiency of the architecture was proven by surpassing 70,000 TPS together with the community.
Q4. What were the main technical challenges faced during the development of Sovereign Chains, and how were they overcome?
The development of Sovereign Chains presented challenges similar to other similar projects in terms of interoperability, composability, security assumptions, and providing an integrated experience. However, MultiversX’s existing infrastructure, which allowed for native cross-chain transactions, addressed these challenges. Traditional bridging and wrapping were eliminated, and smooth asset transfers between chains were facilitated.
Customizable virtual machines enable the transfer of MultiversX network capabilities to other chains, tailoring features to specific use cases. The Gravity Layer’s restaking module allows users to support the economy of new Sovereign Chains.
Q5. MultiversX is known for features like on-chain 2FA and native standards. How do these features integrate with Sovereign Chains?
All the advanced features that have made MultiversX a premier destination for builders and users are available by default on Sovereign Chains. On-chain 2FA protection and native standards are leveraged from the underlying architecture and security protocols of MultiversX. Users who activate their 2FA require an additional signature for each transaction, providing multi-factor protection directly on-chain.
Native token standards eliminate the need for dedicated smart contracts for token transactions, reducing attack vectors and ensuring an efficient execution layer for token transfers. These tokens benefit from protocol-level guarantees, ensuring secure and transparent transactions across the chain and network.
Q6. How do Sovereign Chains elegantly tie ecosystems without involving traditional bridging or wrapping mechanisms?
The ability to customize and run multiple virtual machines (VMs) in parallel is central to Sovereign Chains. Developers can deploy various VMs, such as EVM and MultiversX VM, on a single chain, ensuring seamless asset and smart contract interactions without external bridges.
Customizable VMs enhance compatibility and performance by tailoring execution environments to specific needs. This multi-VM approach facilitates secure, direct interactions across blockchain networks, eliminating complexities and vulnerabilities associated with bridges. The architecture enables fluid and secure asset and data movement across ecosystems, supporting a truly interconnected blockchain environment without additional wrapping processes.
Q7. How does the concept of ‘borrowing’ security from MultiversX, known as shared security, benefit new blockchain networks?
Sovereign Chains utilize the security and trust features of MultiversX through the Gravity Layer. This is achieved through a dual-staking model, where both EGLD and the Sovereign Chain’s native token can be staked. This setup mitigates the risk of security issues linked to the native token’s volatility and creates a stable base of economic trust.
Validators can support any Sovereign Chain option for Gravity, enhancing security through shared economic incentives and decentralized trust. This shared security framework allows new projects to start with high security and economic stability, facilitating innovation and growth without heavy initial investments.
Q8. How does the Gravity Layer restaking module work, and what impact do you anticipate it will have on the staking yield for EGLD?
The Gravity Layer restaking module enhances the staking ecosystem by allowing EGLD holders to further re-stake their tokens on both the main MultiversX network and Sovereign Chains. EGLD is staked on the mainnet and locked for use on Sovereign Chains, securing both networks simultaneously. By participating in this system, users potentially double or triple their staking yield.
Q9. Can you share more details about the potential airdrops and other incentives designed to attract community attention to Sovereign Chains?
Multiple teams working on their Sovereign Chains instances are exploring incentives to generate attention. These incentives may include potential airdrops and other rewarding systems, but the details are still being decided.
MultiversX and the Sovereign Chains dev community are focused on fostering a vibrant and engaged community to support the development and growth of these projects. Community-building efforts are a crucial part of the strategy to solidify and expand the Web3 ecosystem.
Q10. What are the next steps for MultiversX following the launch of Sovereign Chains?
MultiversX has an ambitious roadmap ahead. The company plans to implement performance and scalability improvements through parallel processing and introduce confidential transactions to enhance privacy. On the product side, xExchange V3 will launch soon, offering an enhanced DeFi experience. The xPortal app and card will receive significant updates, and xFabric will become a leading no-code platform for Web3 engagement. MultiversX is also preparing for the next xLaunchpad debut and a major xDay announcement.
Q11. How do you see the blockchain landscape evolving in the next 5-10 years, and what role do you envision MultiversX playing in that future?
Several trends are driving the blockchain space, including the growth of DeFi, the regulatory framework, enterprise adoption, and security. MultiversX is well-positioned to execute on these fronts, especially with the help of Sovereign Chains.
Unlike centralized Layer 2 solutions, MultiversX’s trustless approach ensures that Sovereign Chains will not be regulated as securities. This aligns with regulatory frameworks and emphasizes the utility and governance functions of crypto tokens.
The flexibility of Sovereign Chains makes them ideal for corporate and public sector use cases. As regulation progresses and companies seek to leverage blockchain capabilities, options like Sovereign Chains become necessary for scalability, interoperability, security, and compliance. MultiversX aims to set the benchmark for how technology should conduct itself, not just as a project but as a leading force in the blockchain ecosystem.
Q12. What advice would you give to developers and enterprises looking to scale their operations on MultiversX’s blockchain?
Engaging with the MultiversX community, testing the architecture, trying the tools, and experiencing the performance are the smartest steps developers can take. MultiversX organizes developer sessions, business conversations, challenges, and hackathons, providing ample opportunities to learn and explore within the ecosystem. Developers can also take advantage of the Sovereign Chains grant program.
Familiarizing oneself with the architecture, documentation, and libraries/SDKs is essential. The MultiversX team is available to answer technical questions and guide the process of creating dApps or Sovereign Chains.
