Author: TechFlow
Introduction: When Solana’s genes are injected into the EVM
In 2023, Solana returned to the center of the crypto stage with an amazing recovery. From AI infrastructure to SocialFi applications, from Meme craze to high-frequency trading protocols, the innovation and wealth effect of Solana's ecosystem attracted the attention of the entire industry. On the other hand, Ethereum's developers and community fell into a subtle split - disputes over team structure, bottlenecks in EVM performance, slow development efficiency, etc., made many people confused about the future of Ethereum.
As one of the most popular public chains in recent times, Monad is often known for its "parallel execution" feature. In fact, in addition to parallel execution, Monad DB and other innovations, Monad also claims to be the "fastest EVM".
Monad is not a simple copy of Ethereum's code. It is compatible with the EVM ecosystem, but has Solana's high throughput and low latency genes; it was founded by former core members of Jump Trading and has attracted support from Solana star projects such as Phantom, Pyth, and Backpack.
Monad's ambition is to allow EVM developers to not have to compromise on performance, so that Solana's capital and innovation can take root in the EVM ecosystem. Can Monad become the next dark horse of the public chain? Let's find out when the test network arrives.
Survival rules of public chains: performance, ecology and wealth effect
There are many ways to succeed, but there are many reasons for failure.
According to incomplete statistics, at least 10 public chain projects will launch tokens or test networks in Q1. In such a fiercely competitive public chain arena, how can they survive and build an ecosystem?
1. Real product orientation rather than empty narrative.
The success of Hyperliquid proves this point - its Layer 1 architecture designed specifically for the financial market, with 200,000 TPS and sub-second latency, directly meets the needs of high-frequency traders. Public chains must solve real problems rather than rely on empty marketing rhetoric.
True product orientation requires a solid technical foundation. A simple fork is not enough to make a public chain stand out or maintain long-term competitiveness. If you blindly pursue "institutional products" while ignoring performance optimization and user needs, you will eventually be eliminated by the market.
2. Developers are the blood of the ecosystem
Before the mainnet launch, Base established deep links with developers through various types of popular science, incentives, office hours, etc.
Solana has made AI and SocialFi into new ecological labels through hackathons and financial support. The development path of the public chain must closely follow market trends, rather than developing behind closed doors.
Activities such as Solana's hackathon and Sui's Pitch Day are all vigorously supporting developers, injecting new vitality into the ecosystem, and fully demonstrating the importance of developers in the ecosystem.
3. The wealth effect is hard currency
We must admit that in the public chain track, the importance of operation is as critical as the technology itself. Looking back at the previous Movement/Berachain, they also put a lot of effort into the operation strategy and successfully attracted a lot of attention.
The recent Solana Meme/AI coin craze (such as BOME, WIF), Virtuals' on-chain game token economy, and even $DEGEN on the Base chain have all proven that the wealth effect is one of the core driving forces to attract users. The recent BNB Chain has further proved this point. A "$TST" and a MyShell new issue directly mobilized user emotions.
A public chain without a "wealth-making story" is destined to be difficult to break out of the circle.
Only by combining the performance advantages based on technological innovation, vigorously supporting developers, and the wealth effect centered on assets can we achieve the long-term healthy development of the ecosystem.
Bullish Monad: Why it could be the next game-changer
1. Technological innovation: When EVM meets high-frequency trading engine
Monad is not a fork. In order to make EVM more performant, Monad has made four key native innovations to address the limitations of existing Ethereum-compatible blockchains:
MonadDB database: A custom state database optimized for EVM storage mode. Unlike traditional databases, MonadDB stores Merkle Patricia Trie structures directly on disk, reducing overhead and enabling efficient parallel state access.
Parallel Execution: Monad executes multiple transactions simultaneously, assuming the initial state is consistent, thereby increasing throughput. It eventually ensures consistency by re-executing transactions with conflicting inputs.
Asynchronous Execution: By decoupling consensus from execution, Monad allows the entire block time to be used for transaction processing instead of interleaving execution during the consensus process, thereby greatly improving the network's computational bandwidth.
Monad BFT: Based on HotStuff's Byzantine Fault Tolerant consensus mechanism, it reduces the communication phase from three rounds to two rounds, advancing rounds with actual network latency to improve performance. This consensus mechanism only requires moderate hardware, making it easy for anyone to run a node.
For more details, see: https://docs.monad.xyz/
These innovations enable Monad to achieve excellent performance while being fully compatible with the EVM, ensuring that developers can easily migrate their applications without any modifications. This not only breaks the performance bottleneck of the EVM, but also provides strong support for the innovation of developers and the ecosystem, attracting more developers to join, and becoming an important foundation for the vigorous development of the ecosystem.
2. Ecosystem support: Builder-centered, providing unlimited innovation space
Mach, Foundry, Madness, Jumpstart, Monad 101, evm/accathon... As an emerging public chain, Monad provides the most types of support plans for developers and project parties.
- Mach: Provides mentoring, financing and other support to teams through the online Mach-1 & Mach-2 acceleration programs.
- Foundry: Provides a co-working space for project partners to inspire each other and innovate.
- Madness: Monad's large offline project roadshow event has been held twice, in New York and Bangkok. More than 10 projects have received nearly one million US dollars in funding support on site. Monad Madness Hong Kong will be held in April.
- Jumpstart: Invite outstanding Web3 Builders to provide development guidance for Monad ecosystem projects.
- Monad 101: An offline event for the Monad ecosystem, providing an opportunity for developers and the community to connect with each other.
- evm/accathon: Joins forces with multiple ecological partners to provide top-level support from the Monad team and top people in the encryption field.
Through diverse ecological support and community building, Monad provides comprehensive empowerment for developers. Obviously, Monad is not in a hurry to go online, but focuses on cultivating the ecosystem, incubating innovation, and especially supporting native projects. This is also a reflection of Monad's long-termism.
The Monad ecosystem has seen the emergence of several iconic projects, such as:
- Innovative CLOB protocol Kuru;
- aPriori, the MEV&LSD protocol with over 10 million yuan in financing;
- Token issuance becomes a gamified launchpad Nad.fun for “teaming up to fight monsters”;
- Mozi Wallet, which lowers the barrier to entry for Web3 users through Telegram integration and gamified revenue management;
- Trading "narratives" with leverage;
Although these projects may not surpass Solana’s flagship application in the short term, they are building a unique eco-label and innovation for Monad.
3. Funding logic: Solana’s genes and capital support
Monad’s founding team came from Jump Trading, a high-frequency trading giant that was an important promoter of Solana in its early days. Jump’s background injected two major genes into Monad:
- Technical Strength: From parallel execution to pipeline optimization, Monad's architectural design clearly bears the imprint of high-frequency trading;
- Capital Network: Backpack/Phantom wallets have publicly announced that they will support Monad as soon as possible, and Pyth Oracle will also give priority to supporting Monad... These "old friends" of the Solana ecosystem are paving a golden track for Monad.
In addition, Monad's $225 million in financing (from top institutions such as Paradigm and Dragonfly) provides sufficient ammunition for its ecological support. Just as Multicoin cultivated the Solana ecosystem, Monad's capital is replicating this path.
Standing at the crossroads of EVM and Solana, reshaping the spring of EVM
Infusing Solana performance into the EVM isn’t just a narrative.
Solana represents high performance; EVM represents friendliness to more developers.
More importantly, Monad is not a fork of any kind. Instead, it redesigns the underlying architecture of the EVM through native innovation, allowing the EVM to compete head-on with Solana for the first time.
It is neither a substitute for Ethereum nor a replica of Solana, but a "new species" that attempts to bridge the gap between the two major ecosystems.
For developers, Monad provides performance upgrades without compromise;
For capital, it is the continuation of Solana’s genes in the EVM ecosystem;
For users, it is a low-threshold, highly interactive entrance to on-chain life.
Challenges still exist: How to balance decentralization and high performance? How to avoid being questioned as a “capital game”? How to establish a unique advantage in the competition with Solana and Hyperliquid?
Can Monads recreate the golden age of EVM?
The emergence of Monad has injected a shot of adrenaline into the EVM ecosystem. When the fastest EVM meets Solana’s capital and innovation, this experiment may redefine the rules of public chain competition.
