The Ethereum ecosystem gathers in Bangkok to review the latest developments of mainstream projects during the Devcon conference

Author: Frank , PANews

The Devcon conference is an important event hosted by the Ethereum Foundation, primarily aimed at developers, artists, makers, and other types of ecosystem builders within the Ethereum ecosystem. Since its inception in 2014, Devcon has been held eight times and has become one of the largest promotional windows for the Ethereum ecosystem. Devcon 2024 will take place from November 12 to November 15, 2024, in Bangkok, Thailand. During this week, many Ethereum ecosystem projects will choose to announce their latest achievements or project progress. PANews has summarized the main project developments during Devcon 2024.

Ethereum:

In the past week, many interesting updates have been released on the Ethereum mainnet. First, on November 7, the Ethereum Foundation announced the launch of a short-term testnet called "Mekong," aimed at testing for the upcoming Pectra upgrade. The main changes in the test include: improving the user experience for crypto wallets and account abstraction; raising the maximum validator staking limit from 32 ETH to 2048 ETH; updating deposit and exit mechanisms, etc.

On November 12, at the Devcon conference in Thailand, Ethereum Foundation researcher Justin Drake proposed a new consensus layer upgrade proposal called "Beam Chain," referred to by the community as "Ethereum 3.0." This proposal aims to achieve several key goals: 1. Faster block times. 2. Lower validator staking requirements. 3. "On-chain snarkification." 4. Improvements in quantum security. The core of Beam Chain lies in the introduction of technologies such as zkVM to significantly enhance the scalability of the Ethereum mainnet, potentially without relying on Layer 2 solutions. However, Justin Drake also stated that this proposal may begin construction in 2026, followed by at least two years of thorough testing before it can be deployed on the mainnet. Some believe this is the largest upgrade since Ethereum's merge, but there are differing opinions in the market. José Maria Macedo, founding partner of Delphi Ventures, stated, "I was excited about the vision for ETH 3.0, but Justin Drake's actual proposal is disappointing. It is essentially a restructured codebase that achieves a 4-second block time and quantum resistance, which will be realized in 2029-2030. These upgrades alone are not enough to make Ethereum Layer 1 competitive, and they do not even instill confidence in its competitiveness. The Ethereum Foundation needs to have bigger dreams."

Additionally, at Devcon 2024, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin also attended and delivered a keynote speech, describing Ethereum as a "world computer," outlining the progress of the Ethereum network and its future vision, with a focus on decentralization, scalability, and inclusivity.

Arbitrum:

On October 7, the Arbitrum Foundation announced the "Road to Devcon" plan, aimed at increasing investment in the Asian market. This plan includes hosting in-person events called ArbiLink in Vietnam and Indonesia to connect with the rapidly growing local developer communities. On November 13, during the Devcon event, Arbitrum announced support for the ERC-7683 standard to facilitate cross-chain intentions. ERC-7683 was proposed by Uniswap Labs and Across in May 2024, aiming to enhance interoperability between different blockchains by standardizing the order structure for cross-chain transactions.

Base:

During Devcon, Coinbase also launched several strategic initiatives in the on-chain payment sector. On November 13, Coinbase announced the acquisition of the Utopia Labs team, which focuses on stablecoin technology and on-chain payment solutions. Jesse Pollak, head of Coinbase Wallet and founder of Base, stated, "We hope to see 50 countries integrated into the Coinbase wallet by the end of 2025." On the 14th, Coinbase Wallet announced that it would soon launch a "tap-to-pay" crypto payment solution, and Base would achieve Layer 2 interoperability within months. Currently, Base is the second hottest public chain project in this bull market, just behind Solana, and these initiatives from Coinbase are expected to further enhance its leading position in the cryptocurrency payment sector.

Unichain:

As a recently popular Layer 2 project, Unichain's progress is also one of the main highlights of this Devcon event. On November 10, Unichain released an access guide for early developers, detailing how to bridge Ethereum (ETH) on its network and perform withdrawal operations. On November 12, Circle announced that its USDC stablecoin would soon support the Layer 2 network Unichain launched by Uniswap Labs. However, in response to the community's premature enthusiasm, Unichain's official statement on the 12th indicated that the mainnet has not yet gone live, the bridge specifications have not been finalized, and the RPC for developer access has been disabled due to unpreparedness.

Filecoin:

During the Devcon conference, two L2 projects in the Filecoin ecosystem announced their latest developments. Akave announced the completion of a $3.45 million funding round, with investors including Protocol Labs, Blockchange VC, Lightshift, and Blockchain Builders Fund. Another L2 project, Storacha Network, announced the launch of its Alpha version network, focusing on high-performance hot storage, primarily targeting high-demand application scenarios such as gaming, artificial intelligence, and DePIN. Additionally, Filecoin plans to conduct the "v24 Tuk Tuk upgrade" around November 20, reducing transaction completion time from 7.5 hours to a few seconds.

BNB Chain:

During Devcon, BNB Chain announced a partnership with the TADA mini-program to provide free ride services for users in Bangkok. On November 12, during the conference, BNB Chain announced it had secured a $10 million cloud service credit investment from Google Cloud, aimed at supporting its "Most Valuable Builder" (MVB) program within its ecosystem. Through this collaboration, over 40 projects in the MVB program can each apply for up to $350,000 in Google Cloud credits, primarily for projects in artificial intelligence and cloud computing. Projects in other areas also have the opportunity to receive $200,000 in credit support for a period of two years.

AltLayer:

On November 12, AltLayer announced the upcoming launch of a platform called "Autonome," aimed at providing users with tools to create and deploy autonomous AI agents. This platform will utilize AltLayer's Rollup-as-a-Service (RaaS) technology, allowing users to quickly build and deploy AI agents without a deep technical background. In fact, this is not the first attempt to lower the development threshold for users; in March of this year, AltLayer announced a collaboration with Sei Labs to develop a new product called "Parallel Stack," enabling users to easily deploy applications on Sei with just a few clicks, enhancing development efficiency.

NEAR:

At the Devcon conference, NEAR co-founder Alexander Skidanov was one of the speakers, sharing the latest developments in NEAR's blockchain technology and ecosystem. On November 10, NEAR AI announced the launch of its Alpha version, which includes features such as customized AI smart assistants, cross-platform interaction, and an AI research center. In June of this year, NEAR founder Illia Polosukhin released the overall plan for NEAR AI. As of now, the progress of this plan is still on track.

Polygon:

Although Polygon also held some events during Devcon, their main progress was mostly announced before the conference began, focusing primarily on cross-chain interoperability and network scalability. On November 7, Polygon announced a partnership with blockchain startup Magic Labs to launch a new cross-chain network called "Newton." According to reports, Newton aims to make it as seamless for users to use decentralized applications (dApps) across multiple blockchains as browsing the internet. Additionally, Polygon announced that its AggLayer v0.2 version is planned to go live in early December, supporting connections to any Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatible chain.