This report covers the background, infrastructure technology, community, and the rapidly expanding ecosystem of the Monad blockchain before the mainnet launch.
Author: Four Pillars
Compiled by: Deep Tide TechFlow
This article is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal, business, investment, or tax advice. It should not be relied upon as a basis for making any investment decisions, nor should it be used for accounting, legal, or tax guidance. Mention of specific assets or securities is for illustrative purposes only and does not represent a recommendation or endorsement. The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of any related institutions, organizations, or individuals. The opinions reflected here may change without notice.
Four Pillars has prepared a comprehensive report for individuals related to the Monad blockchain or members of the Monad community attending Korea Blockchain Week (the largest blockchain conference in Asia) and Token 2049.
The report covers the background, infrastructure technology, community, and the rapidly expanding ecosystem of the Monad blockchain before the mainnet launch. Its goal is to enhance understanding of the Monad blockchain, especially for those who may be less familiar with it.
1. Talking about EVM Again? But This Time It's Different
The last market cycle was characterized by numerous chains attempting to accelerate EVM scalability. It is not an exaggeration to describe this period as a rapid expansion of various EVM-compatible chains. In addition to Ethereum and the many Rollup projects built on it, projects like Polygon (Matic), Avalanche C-Chain (AVAX), NEAR AURORA (NEAR), and Binance Smart Chain (BSC) emerged to provide faster EVM execution environments, with particularly significant growth. Therefore, in the current market cycle, the narrative of "Ethereum scaling solutions" seems somewhat outdated and fails to attract significant market attention. Nevertheless, the Monad blockchain has reintroduced the concept of "scalable EVM," unexpectedly garnering considerable attention in the market. Why is that?
1.1 EVM Compatible, but Like Solana
"The value proposition of Monad is very simple. The current performance of EVM is still not good enough, and everyone wants higher performance, faster transaction speeds, and lower transaction costs." — Keone Hon, Co-founder and CEO of Monad Labs.
The "slightly faster EVM-compatible chains" I mentioned earlier are indeed faster than Ethereum and have relatively lower transaction costs. However, compared to Solana (the standout non-EVM blockchain from the last cycle, seen as a viable alternative to Ethereum), they still fall short in several aspects. In terms of speed, Solana is the fastest blockchain and offers the lowest transaction costs. This places the "fast EVM-compatible chains" from the last cycle in a relatively mediocre position. Although they are faster than Ethereum, Solana is generally regarded as the best infrastructure for building transaction-optimized applications. Therefore, there remains a demand in the market for a blockchain that can match Solana's speed while leveraging the existing EVM developer community.
The Monad blockchain aims to fill this gap with its technology, becoming a "high-performance blockchain capable of parallel processing within EVM." To some extent, Monad Labs has promoted the concept of EVM parallel processing in the blockchain space. If the Monad blockchain can achieve its target metrics (10,000 TPS and 1 block confirmation time), it may become the first blockchain to combine Solana-like speed with full EVM compatibility.
1.2 Advanced Optimization
Simply replacing the consensus mechanism with a faster one and then running EVM on top of it has some technical limitations (this has been the approach taken by most EVM-compatible Layer 1 chains). To truly achieve a fast and scalable EVM, optimizations are needed not only at the consensus layer but across all layers—consensus, execution, and storage (detailed discussions on these aspects will be provided in the technical section later). In other words, merely implementing EVM on a blockchain infrastructure with fast block times and high TPS is not sufficient. For example, Ethermint faced significant challenges when implementing the EVM execution environment on Tendermint because it could not fully leverage Tendermint's speed within the EVM environment. This highlights the necessity for a more comprehensive solution.
Thus, the goal of the Monad blockchain is not limited to accelerating the consensus mechanism. It seeks to fundamentally change the execution environment, introduce parallel processing, and improve data storage methods to build a truly fast EVM chain. A detailed explanation of Monad blockchain technology will be provided later.
1.3 Community-Driven Ecosystem
"The crypto community is generally amazing because many people care about things before they are perfect." — Keone Hon, Co-founder and CEO of Monad Labs.
Finally, let's talk about the community. Simply supporting EVM is not enough to attract developers to join the Monad ecosystem. Therefore, Monad Labs focuses on creating a unique and attractive community to build an appealing ecosystem for developers. While I will delve deeper into this later, it is worth emphasizing that the Monad blockchain has already established a strong community before the mainnet launch, which is a highly strategic move. Ultimately, Layer 1 blockchains need to attract developers, and developers need user support for their applications. Since most users come from the community, the more loyal community members a blockchain has, the easier it is to attract top developers. To some extent, the Monad blockchain has laid a solid user base to attract skilled service providers. This approach is particularly effective in the blockchain space, and Monad's ability to execute this strategy demonstrates the team's exceptional capabilities. I will provide more details on how Monad builds a strong community later.
From just these three characteristics, it is clear that the Monad blockchain is distinct. I believe these reasons explain the high expectations the market has for the Monad blockchain. So, who are the people behind Monad Labs, and what are their experiences?
2. Monad Labs: A Team Aligned with the Vision
Source: Monad Labs
"At Jump (Keone's previous company), everything was about performance. Whether it was systems or everyone in the trading teams, they needed to be very efficient and do their best. This is what I learned at Jump." — Keone Hon, Co-founder and CEO of Monad Labs.
Among the team at Monad Labs, several members have previously worked at Jump Trading. CEO Keone and CTO James both have backgrounds in Jump Trading, along with several other engineers. Notably, many of Monad Labs' developers have extensive experience building and optimizing systems for trading firms. This background reflects the characteristics of the Monad blockchain. Monad Labs aims to create a "highly efficient and fast EVM blockchain." Additionally, since their goal is to optimize the blockchain for handling complex financial transactions, it makes perfect sense to have engineers from trading firms on the team, as they possess high skills in "optimization, efficiency, and system improvement."
Of course, what matters is not just the engineers. Monad Labs also places equal importance on building a strong community, which is as crucial as creating a more efficient EVM environment. As a result, Monad Labs has successfully established one of the most passionate blockchain communities alongside Berachain. In my view, team members like Bill, who holds the unique position of "Cultural Leader" at Monad Labs, and Kevin McCordic, the founder of the Twitter Intern account, are key contributors to this achievement. These individuals have a deep understanding of web3 culture—Bill has a good track record of successfully managing numerous NFT projects, while Kevin is well-regarded for promoting the intern account trend, which many Web3 companies now emulate. They continuously create content that community members love on Twitter and other platforms.
While some may think that the Monad blockchain's community was primarily built through airdrops, this is not entirely accurate (I will elaborate on this later). Airdrops are something any project can do. What sets the Monad community apart is the intrinsic value it offers as a community, which is at the core of what Bill and Kevin provide.
Among the various values supporting Monad, the most important are undoubtedly technology and community. From the team's composition, it is clear that they have assembled an optimal team to realize these two core values. (Since this report focuses on Monad's technology and community, I encourage you to continue reading for a deeper understanding.)
3. In-Depth Exploration of Monad Blockchain Technology
Let’s delve into one of the core values of the Monad blockchain: technology. The technology of the Monad blockchain can be divided into three main components: consensus, execution, and storage. In this section, we will take a closer look at the innovations Monad has made in these areas.
3.1 Consensus of Monad Blockchain - Monad BFT
The rapid scalability of Monad stems from its consensus mechanism. Monad BFT is similar to Aptos BFT and Diem BFT, being an evolved version of traditional Byzantine Fault Tolerance (BFT) systems. Next, we will explore the specific features of Monad BFT.
3.1.1 The Process of Monad BFT
To understand the characteristics of Monad BFT, it is essential to first grasp how consensus is reached within the system. To do this, we will define a few key terms:
Quorum Certificate (QC): A certificate issued when two-thirds of the nodes in the network validate the correctness of the previous block.
Timeout Certificate (TC): A certificate issued when two-thirds of the nodes in the network fail to validate the correctness of the previous block (usually when a valid block proposal is not received within the expected time).
For simplicity, we will refer to the initial round as round K, and subsequent rounds as K+1, K+2, and so on. The QC for round K is referred to as QC(K), and the QCs for subsequent rounds are referred to as QC(K+1), QC(K+2), etc. The QC or TC from the previous round before the initial round is denoted as QC(K-1) or TC(K-1).
The operation of Monad BFT is as follows:
Leader of Each Round: Each round has a leader responsible for driving the process of that round. The leader is predetermined and assigned periodically to each round.
Two Phases of Each Round:
1. Proposal Phase: The leader proposes a block to the validators.
2. Voting Phase: Validators vote on the proposal and send their votes to the leader of the next round.
If everything goes smoothly, messages are transmitted without network issues, and the process follows a linear communication pattern, where messages flow from one (the leader) to many (the validators) and then back to one (the leader of the next round). However, if validators fail to receive the leader's proposal in a timely manner, they need to communicate with each other, leading to the emergence of a secondary communication pattern, which requires cross-validation among validators beforehand.
The block proposal includes the new block and the voting information from the previous round, which is why Monad BFT is referred to as a "pipelining" mechanism (which will be discussed in detail later).
Processing Proposals:
If validators receive a valid proposal, they send a YES vote to the leader of the next round. If two-thirds of the votes are YES, the leader of the next round will issue a QC for the proposal from the previous round.
If validators receive an invalid proposal or no proposal at all, they will generate a timeout message and broadcast it to all other validators. If any validator receives two-thirds of the timeout messages, they will create a TC and send it to the leader of the next round. The TC also includes the latest QC information observed by the validators.
Issuing New Proposals:
- The leader of round K+1 will issue a QC or receive a TC based on the results of the previous round. They will then create a new proposal that includes (1) the transactions of the new block, (2) the latest QC (if the previous round was successful, it comes from the previous round, or in the case of a timeout, from the most recently successful round), and (3) if the previous round ended due to a timeout, it will include the TC.
Final Confirmation of Blocks:
Validators will only finally confirm the proposal from round K after receiving the QC from round K+1 in round K+2. Let’s break this down:
Holding the QC from round K means that at least two-thirds of the validators voted YES in that round.
However, merely holding the QC is not sufficient for final confirmation of the block, as validators cannot confirm whether other validators also hold the same result. Therefore, it is still unsafe to execute transactions.
This is why validators must wait until round K+2 to ensure that the quorum validators in round K+1 issued the QC, confirming that the block from round K has indeed been finally confirmed. Only then can validators be confident that the block has been validated by the majority of validators and can be safely executed.
3.1.2 Differences Between Monad BFT and HotStuff
As mentioned earlier, Monad BFT divides the consensus process into multiple rounds, with each round consisting of two phases. In the first phase, the leader sends a proposal to the validators, and in the second phase, the validators send signed responses back to the leader to finalize the consensus. The significant difference between Monad BFT and HotStuff lies in the number of phases involved. HotStuff typically requires three phases, which introduces additional delays in the consensus process. In contrast, Monad BFT reduces this to two phases. Monad BFT is able to do this because, in the event of network issues (such as failing to receive the leader's proposal in a timely manner), validators can communicate directly with each other to skip the problematic round.
Linear Communication vs. Secondary Communication
In the secondary communication pattern, after the leader broadcasts the proposal to the nodes, each node must broadcast its voting data to all other nodes, resulting in network costs proportional to n² (where n is the number of nodes). This includes the leader's broadcast (n) and each node broadcasting its vote to all other nodes (n). In contrast, in the linear communication pattern, nodes only need to transmit their votes to the leader of the next round, reducing the network cost to approximately n (the leader broadcasts to n nodes, and each node's vote is only transmitted to one node). This improvement in linear communication enhances the throughput of the blockchain and reduces latency.
If the network is functioning well, Monad BFT relies on linear communication. As mentioned earlier, this approach does not allow validators to cross-validate the integrity of the leader within a single round. Therefore, the final confirmation of the block in round K occurs in round K+2.
3.1.3 Pipelining
In simple terms, pipelining involves breaking down the entire consensus process so that it is processed across multiple rounds rather than completed in a single round. For example, suppose there is a block N, followed by block N+1. Even if the quorum has voted on the message sent by the leader and generated a quorum certificate (QC) for block N, this does not mean that the certificate must be finally confirmed in block N—it can be carried over (piggybacked) to block N+1.
The process and methodology of Monad BFT may seem similar to Diem BFT, but Monad BFT has some unique key components—shared memory pool, delayed execution, transportation fees, and reserve balances.
3.1.4 Separation of Execution and Consensus - Delayed Execution
One of the notable features of the Monad blockchain is the separation of transaction execution from the consensus process, which enhances the efficiency of consensus. As we learned in modular blockchain design, execution and consensus are two distinct concepts. Consensus involves how transactions are included in blocks, while execution is the actual processing of those transactions to change the state. In the Monad blockchain, the leaders and validators participating in consensus vote on proposals but do not execute transactions.
So, why does the Monad blockchain separate execution from consensus? Let’s first look at Ethereum. In Ethereum, execution occurs before consensus. This means that during Ethereum's consensus process, validators must 1) reach consensus on the transactions in the block, and 2) reach consensus on the Merkle root generated after executing those transactions. This requires the leader to execute all transactions before sharing the proposal, and validators must also execute transactions before voting. This creates significant overhead, as gas limits must be carefully estimated, leading to very tight consensus times.
The Monad blockchain addresses this issue by separating execution from consensus: when nodes execute transactions in block K, they can simultaneously participate in the consensus for block K+1. This design allows execution to follow consensus, enabling the blockchain to operate within reasonable gas budgets. The premise of this separation is that once a majority of nodes reach consensus on the order of transactions, the results are determined.
However, separating execution and consensus also raises a question: "If transactions are ordered without updating the state (since execution follows consensus), is it possible to include user transactions without gas fees, potentially leading to denial-of-service attacks (DDOS)?" To address this issue, the Monad blockchain introduces the concept of transportation fees.
3.1.5 Transportation Fees and Reserve Balances
Transportation fees refer to the "transaction fees" associated with transactions. Since the Monad blockchain separates execution from consensus, its transaction fee structure is also unique. Typically, transaction fees are paid at the time of transaction execution, but in the Monad blockchain, execution fees and transportation fees are separate. If a transaction has the necessary transportation fees but lacks the required execution fees, that transaction will fail. This design prevents users from repeatedly attempting to send transactions when they lack sufficient funds.
Additionally, nodes create a reserve balance for each account, which is a separate balance specifically for transportation fees. The purpose of the reserve balance is to ensure that only transactions that have paid the necessary fees can be included in blocks.
3.2 Execution of Monad Blockchain - Parallel Execution
After understanding the consensus mechanism of the Monad blockchain, we will next explore how the Monad blockchain handles transactions. The attention that the Monad blockchain has garnered in the industry, along with the keywords that now define it—parallel transaction processing—originates from this area. So, how does the Monad blockchain achieve parallel transaction processing?
3.2.1 Parallel Transaction Processing
Let’s consider two transactions, referred to as:
Transaction A: Account A receives Monad blockchain tokens from Account B.
Transaction B: Account A sends Monad blockchain tokens to Account C.
If these two transactions are processed in parallel (i.e., transaction B starts before transaction A is completed), then after these parallel transactions, the balance of account A may differ from the balance if these transactions were processed sequentially. This could lead to transaction execution errors.
To address this issue, the Monad blockchain adopts an approach inspired by Software Transactional Memory (STM) and Optimistic Concurrency Control (OCC). As the term OCC suggests, the Monad blockchain assumes that all transactions are valid and continues execution, only re-executing transactions when issues arise during the validation process. Monad ensures that the results of these executions are the same as those obtained when processing transactions sequentially, meaning that even if transactions are processed in parallel, their state updates are merged sequentially to ensure the validity of parallel execution. In other words, the Monad blockchain first processes transactions and then reprocesses any problematic transactions based on the information obtained from the initial execution, rather than validating the dependencies between transactions in advance.
This approach is much more efficient than pre-validating transaction dependencies and executing accordingly. In an optimistic transaction parallel processing model, once all previous transactions in a block have been processed, it becomes clear which transactions need to be re-executed. At this point, since the state values of previous transactions have been merged, the risk of failure when re-executing transactions is minimal (in this case, transactions cannot fail). Additionally, tasks like signature recovery do not need to be repeated during re-execution, and the accounts or storage accessed during transaction execution remain unchanged, making this approach highly efficient.
3.3 Storage of the Monad Blockchain - Monad DB
In practice, parallel processing at the execution layer is not particularly difficult. It has been implemented in multiple blockchains, but the key question is whether parallel transaction processing can be conducted efficiently. The Monad blockchain focuses on performance, which means that information about all accounts in the blockchain grows rapidly. This information is stored in the state of the blockchain, and as the size of the state increases, it can lead to performance degradation, thereby undermining the advantages of parallel transaction processing. Therefore, efficiently managing the blockchain state is crucial for parallel transaction processing.
To address this issue, the Monad blockchain has developed a unique database structure to efficiently manage state—Monad DB. Most Ethereum clients use key-value databases based on B-tree structures (like LMDB) or LSM tree structures (like LevelDB and RocksDB). However, Ethereum uses a data structure called the Merkle Patricia Tree (MPT) to store state, which is less efficient because it uses MPT within another data structure (the key-value database). Monad DB solves this problem by natively implementing the Patricia tree structure on disk and in memory.
Additionally, Monad DB supports asynchronous I/O, allowing the CPU to process multiple transactions simultaneously without waiting for the input and output of transactions. Traditional Ethereum databases do not support asynchronous I/O, while Monad DB's support significantly improves transaction processing efficiency.
In addition to these features, Monad DB enhances the I/O process through optimizations such as bypassing the file system, reducing unnecessary overhead, and thus improving database performance. This ensures that not only is the execution layer optimized, but efficient transaction processing can also be achieved at the database level.
4. Not Just Technology, the Interesting Community Building Approach of the Monad Blockchain
So far, we have explored the technology of the Monad blockchain, which is considered one of its key advantages. But what about the other important aspect of Monad blockchain's success—its community? It is well known that the rapid growth of the Monad blockchain is attributed to a strong and mature community. Currently, there are about 380,000 members on the Monad Discord, giving us a preliminary understanding of the large scale of its community. Additionally, on the X platform, memes symbolizing the Monad community are still actively shared, mainly revolving around posts from Monad Labs members and official accounts. So, what drives people's enthusiasm for the Monad blockchain?
First, one thing is clear: as I mentioned earlier, airdrops are not the main reason for the growth of this community. Airdrops are tools that anyone can use. If Monad relied solely on airdrops to build its community, other projects could also create communities of similar scale. However, the Monad blockchain, along with Berachain, is considered one of the projects in the blockchain space with the most passionate community. Therefore, it is inaccurate to simply attribute the success of Monad's community strategy to airdrops.
“Quality > Quantity”.
“Automating tasks is not a good strategy. On some platforms, people claim rewards for 'followers, likes, and retweets,' and while this may seem like a low-cost way to boost engagement, it actually dilutes the real users who would participate naturally. When you see 7,200 likes, 7,200 retweets, and 10,000 views, it looks quite bad. Don’t sacrifice real users who will stay in your community for months or years just to gain bot engagement—you can never create a sustainable loop this way.” — Kevin McCordic, Head of Growth at Monad Labs.
When we closely observe the interactions of Monad community members and the strategies employed by Monad Labs in community building, it becomes clear that the view that Monad relies entirely on airdrops to create its community is unlikely. Undoubtedly, there are more important factors uniting this community beyond mere economic incentives. Furthermore, Monad Labs does not seem to view the community as a short-term marketing campaign to generate interest. So, what drives the strong community of the Monad blockchain? What kind of thought processes and strategic actions enable Monad to create such an influential community? Let’s explore step by step.
4.1 Nads Represent Culture, EVM/ACC Represents Vision
At the core of the Monad community is its vibrant meme culture. Anyone familiar with crypto Twitter may have seen the purple Monanimals, a meme that originated from the Monad community, symbolically representing their "cult" culture. This is just one example; community members refer to themselves as "Nads," constantly creating and reshaping memes, images (such as keonegg), and language (such as Gmonad) to express the identity of the Monad community. Participating in these memes plays a key role not only in strengthening internal connections within the community but also in enhancing the visibility of the Monad community externally.
However, is the growth of the Monad blockchain's strong community solely attributed to its meme culture? In my view, these memes serve more as a catalyst for growth rather than the fundamental reason. The true driving force behind the rapid development and solid foundation of the Monad community—often referred to as the "One Team" concept—lies in the shared vision between community members and Monad Labs: EVM/ACC. While Nads represent culture, EVM/ACC embodies the essence of the community.
The technical vision of the Monad blockchain focuses on scaling the EVM, aiming for "10,000 TPS and 1 block finality." It is this clear goal that prompts community members to frequently mention "EVM/ACC" in their X profiles, indicating their identity as Nads. EVM/ACC is a variant of "e/acc," representing "Effectiveness Efficiency"—a philosophy advocating for unrestricted technological advancement, especially in fields like artificial intelligence. This stands in stark contrast to the so-called "decel" movement, which advocates for slowing down technological progress due to potential risks.
So, what does EVM/ACC specifically mean? It can be understood as "unrestricted technological advancement of the EVM blockchain," which perfectly aligns with the Monad blockchain's mission to overcome the limitations of the EVM. When a community shares the same goals as the project they support, it becomes the foundation of a strong community. This consistency allows community members to become fans supporting the project's success, while the project team can view the community as an important partner in its growth, encouraging active participation.
I often compare blockchains to countries, considering how a country operates is similar to how Monad Labs builds and develops its community. Monad Labs sets clear technical goals—creating a "high-performance blockchain capable of EVM parallel processing"—and those who resonate with this goal come together to form a community with a shared vision. From there, unique community activities, including memes, help attract more members and maintain the existing community.
As mentioned earlier, airdrops are implicit economic incentives that almost every project offers to its community. Meme-based marketing has also become a standard approach for crypto projects. However, what sets the Monad blockchain apart and enables it to build such a uniquely successful community is that the project had a clear and compelling goal from the very beginning, allowing people to genuinely resonate with and support it.
4.2 Application of Systematic Methodology in Community Building
This month, I had calls with over 10 S-tier crypto projects to discuss how to build stronger marketing and community flywheels—here are some tips shared publicly.
10 Rules for Crypto Marketing and Community: A Systematic Approach
- Stop posting ads.
If your main Twitter account keeps talking about your product, that’s advertising. People hate ads. When you open YouTube to watch a specific video, you can’t wait to skip the pop-up ads. Crypto Twitter is no different. If you continuously post ads, don’t be surprised when people don’t like your brand or engage.
- You are competing with influencers and entertainment content on Twitter, not just with other protocols.
When most people open crypto Twitter, they are checking what Cobie has posted, what memes have been created about ETH ETFs, or what’s trending that day—entertainment content they enjoy. You are competing for attention in the same economy as these people, not just against your project’s competitors.
- Your marketing and community strategy should take a systematic approach.
Viewing marketing and community as a complex system with various inputs and outputs, rather than as isolated segments, is a more accurate perspective. There is a flow of interrelated influences between Discord, Telegram, Twitter, and others. Optimizing the good flow between these areas will yield better results than handling each area separately. Community and marketing are intertwined. If you isolate them, both will become less effective. They are a combination—ensuring the system allows them to enhance each other.
Source: X(@intern)
Given the strong central focus that has emerged within the Monad community, it is clear that the ongoing growth of the community and its current form are the results of careful planning and strategic design by Monad Labs. As previously mentioned when introducing Monad Labs members, Kevin McCordic is the Head of Growth at Monad Labs and a driving force behind the popular Intern account trend in crypto projects. He shares insights on marketing and community strategies through his X account. His views reveal the core principles of community and marketing strategies, one key insight being the importance of a systematic approach that establishes a flywheel effect, making community and marketing interrelated and mutually reinforcing.
This flywheel approach ensures that as community engagement increases, marketing efforts are also propelled, attracting more community members and forming a self-sustaining growth loop. The ultimate result is that the community not only grows in numbers but also strengthens in power and cohesion, contributing to the overall success and longevity of the project.
“Your marketing and community strategy should take a systematic approach. More accurately, it should be viewed through the lens of a complex system rather than as one-time isolated areas. There is a flow of interrelated influences between Discord, Telegram, Twitter, etc. Optimizing the good flow between these areas will yield better results than handling each area separately. Community and marketing are interwoven. If you isolate them, the effectiveness of both will diminish. They are a team—ensuring the system can make them mutually enhance each other.” — Kevin McCordic, Head of Growth at Monad Labs
Source: X(@monad_xyz)
For example, recently Monad announced a project competition with a prize pool of up to $1 million, with over 60 venture capital firms participating, which garnered widespread attention. In response, Intern suggested that the community could watch the competition live and vote in real-time. This idea evolved into a broader community discussion about creating a prediction market where members could bet on the competition outcomes. Although the competition was only recently announced and no prediction market platform has officially planned to open a market based on this event, this scenario illustrates the close relationship between community engagement and marketing, and how they can positively impact project growth. In other words, this project competition—Monad's growth activity to attract ecosystem builders and marketing strategy showcasing commitment to ecosystem development—provides content that can capture the attention of community members. The interactions generated around this content further drive discussions and creativity, ultimately contributing to the project's marketing efforts and growth.
Unlike the relatively standardized marketing strategies in traditional industries, community and marketing strategies in crypto projects are still in their early stages, with various discussions and experiments underway. The significant activities of the Monad community, combined with the team's excellent growth strategies, provide valuable insights for future crypto projects. These insights emphasize the importance of having clear goals and direction before starting to build a community, and once a preliminary community is established, adopting a systematic approach that considers the interactions between community and marketing is crucial. This approach can lead to sustainable growth and further innovation.
5. Monad Ecosystem
Through the combination of Monad BFT, parallel transaction processing, and Monad DB, the Monad blockchain achieves significant scalability within its EVM-based network. A mature community, along with these technical factors, creates an ideal environment for innovation and experimentation for project builders. The scalable EVM environment allows for the implementation of high-performance protocols while maintaining minimal friction for developers, users, and liquidity migrating from other EVM-based networks. Additionally, a strong community ensures that new projects have a ready-made audience, making Monad an attractive development ecosystem.
It is no surprise that despite the mainnet not yet being launched, the Monad ecosystem is rapidly expanding. Proven projects such as Phantom Wallet, Wormhole, and Balancer are joining the Monad ecosystem. At the same time, new projects optimized for the Monad blockchain, such as Kuru, aPriori, and Kintsu, are continuously emerging. Many other projects are also preparing to establish themselves in the Monad ecosystem before the mainnet launch. Next, we will explore some interesting applications and infrastructure projects that fill the gaps in the Monad ecosystem.
5.1 Infrastructure and Tools
aPriori
aPriori is a miner extractable value auction (MEVA) infrastructure optimized for Monad BFT. The block production mechanism of the Monad blockchain employs delayed execution, separating execution from consensus. aPriori is designing MEV infrastructure that aligns with this approach and recently secured $10 million in seed funding from Consensys, OKX Ventures, and other institutions, making it a key player in the Monad ecosystem.
Kintsu
Kintsu is a liquid staking protocol similar to Lido Finance on Ethereum, which tokenizes staked assets participating in POS network validation. Liquid Staking Tokens (LSTs) play a crucial role in enhancing capital efficiency within the network, especially during the cold start phase of new Layer 1s like the Monad blockchain. Kintsu recently raised $4 million in seed funding and is becoming a leading liquid staking protocol in the Monad ecosystem, with the potential to integrate and expand across various DeFi applications.
Pyth Network
Pyth Network is an oracle network that provides real-time first-party financial data for DeFi protocols on the blockchain. Pyth currently aggregates data from over 111 first-party data providers and offers real-time price data for crypto assets, stocks, ETFs, and commodities to more than 70 blockchain networks, including the Monad blockchain.
Redstone
Redstone is a modular oracle network that provides real-time price data, focusing on maintaining the peg of interest-bearing tokens such as LSTs and LRTs. Redstone supports over 50 blockchain networks, including the Monad blockchain, and plays a crucial role in ensuring accurate and reliable data feeds.
Switchboard
Switchboard is an oracle aggregator that integrates multiple oracles, such as Pyth Network and Chainlink, into a single transaction. This allows applications to efficiently access the data feeds they need while reducing the risks associated with relying on a single oracle.
LayerZero
LayerZero is a protocol that enables direct communication between blockchains using ultra-light nodes, blockchain endpoints, decentralized oracles, and relayers. LayerZero aims to establish a full-chain network that allows various blockchains to communicate and exchange data reliably.
Wormhole
Wormhole is a bridging protocol launched by Jump Crypto in 2021 that facilitates the transfer of messages and assets between different blockchains, including the Monad blockchain. Wormhole aims to overcome the liquidity fragmentation issue in the blockchain ecosystem by creating an integrated environment where assets and information can flow freely between networks.
Axelar
Similar to Wormhole, Axelar is a cross-chain network that connects various blockchains and enables them to interact. Axelar aims to support not only inter-chain connectivity but also the development of cross-chain decentralized applications (dApps) that can be seamlessly implemented across multiple chains.
Backpack
Backpack initially started as a non-custodial wallet service supporting EVM networks and Solana, later evolving into an ecosystem encompassing NFT collections (Mad Lads), wallets (Backpack Wallet), and exchanges (Backpack Exchange). Monad Labs participated in Backpack's Series A funding, and its trading platform and user base are expected to integrate closely with the Monad blockchain.
Phantom
Phantom is a non-custodial wallet service that initially supported Solana and later expanded its functionality to create a user-friendly mobile environment. Phantom plans to join the Monad ecosystem, expanding its services to achieve chain agnosticism.
Elixir
Elixir is a decentralized market-making protocol that provides liquidity for decentralized exchanges (DEXs) with order books across multiple networks. Integrated with order book perpetual futures exchanges, Elixir minimizes reliance on centralized market makers, allowing retail users to participate in liquidity provision. Given the structure of the Monad blockchain, which supports fast and efficient transaction processing, order book exchanges requiring high-frequency trading can greatly benefit from integration with the Monad blockchain.
Orderly Network
Orderly Network is a full-chain liquidity layer that integrates shared order books across various networks to enhance liquidity for perpetual futures DEXs. New networks like the Monad blockchain often struggle to ensure stable perpetual trading liquidity, but Orderly Network aims to address this issue by providing a shared order book, allowing traders to experience frictionless trading with narrow spreads and minimal slippage.
Notifi
Notifi is an infrastructure that enables Web3 projects to communicate with users on-chain, ranging from simple messages to wallet-to-wallet communication. Notifi plays a significant role in enhancing user experience, allowing any application to choose to interact with end users through notifications or messages.
Tally
Tally provides DAO solutions for Web3 projects conducting on-chain governance. Tally offers a plugin user interface and DAO governance contracts, enabling users to vote on proposals or delegate voting rights. Tally is expected to play an important role in supporting on-chain governance for various projects within the Monad ecosystem.
Nad Name Service
Nad Name Service is a blockchain domain service similar to Ethereum Name Service (ENS). It allows users to own their unique addresses (domain names) within the Monad blockchain. Just like domain names such as .com, .io, and .xyz are used on the internet, Nad Name Service uses .nad domain names, allowing entities to interact through domain name addresses without needing to remember the entire address.
5.2 Decentralized Finance (DeFi)
Kuru
Kuru is a fully on-chain decentralized exchange (DEX) that offers a central limit order book (CLOB) and recently successfully raised $2 million in seed funding. Most EVM-based order book DEXs typically handle user orders and trade matching off-chain before finalizing transactions on-chain, which is a hybrid model. However, Kuru aims to achieve a fully on-chain order book where all orders and trades are processed on-chain, fully leveraging the fast block times and low latency advantages of the Monad blockchain.
Timeswap
Timeswap is a non-oracle lending protocol within the Monad ecosystem. Most lending protocols rely on price data provided by oracles to manage borrowers' collateral ratios and liquidate collateral when it falls below a certain threshold. In contrast, Timeswap matches borrowers and lenders on a peer-to-peer basis, with the loan's maturity date negotiated by both parties. If the borrower fails to repay the loan before the maturity date, their collateral will be forfeited. This mechanism eliminates the need for oracles, allowing Timeswap to create money markets for any ERC-20 based asset, including low-liquidity long-tail assets.
Demask Finance
Demask Finance is an automated market maker (AMM) protocol designed to facilitate trading between NFTs and ERC-20 tokens, helping to liquidate NFT assets. Demask is currently collaborating with some key NFT collections in the Monad ecosystem, such as SpikyNads and Monad Nomads, and is expected to play a significant role in expanding Monad's NFT ecosystem after the mainnet launch.
Curvance
Curvance integrates multiple DeFi protocols, such as Curve, Aura, and Convex, providing a unified interface to optimize liquidity management. Users can deposit or borrow tokens as collateral in an integrated multi-chain environment through Curvance, becoming an important tool for connecting DeFi liquidity across EVM networks, including the Monad blockchain.
Balancer
Balancer is a scalable AMM that offers various liquidity pools and trading services, from concentrated liquidity pools to stable trading and custom liquidity pools. As an OG project that has developed alongside Uniswap and Curve for a long time, Balancer is expected to provide stable trading support in the emerging DeFi ecosystem of the Monad blockchain.
Pancake Swap
Pancake Swap is a leading AMM DEX that initially developed within the BNB network. Recently, Pancake Swap launched Pancake Swap v4, adding new features such as Hook, which allows developers to customize liquidity pools and optimize gas usage. Pancake Swap is actively preparing to join the Monad ecosystem.
5.3 Consumers and Gaming
Kizzy
Kizzy is a new consumer application set to launch in the Monad ecosystem, providing mobile social media betting services. Although it has not been publicly released yet, it has already garnered significant attention, with key figures like CEO Keone Hon actively promoting it.
Laniakea
Laniakea is an open-world MMORPG that offers various game modes, including real-time combat, player versus player (PvP), and player versus environment (PvE) challenges. Due to the game's requirement for high-frequency trading, similar to perpetual futures exchanges, the network performance of the Monad blockchain is expected to provide strong support for delivering these gaming services.
Predicto
Predicto is an upcoming prediction market platform within the Monad ecosystem. With growing interest in prediction markets for the 2025 U.S. presidential election and the rise of platforms like Polymarket, prediction markets are becoming the next significant application area. Predicto is expected to become the primary prediction market for Monad, and with the active community of the Monad blockchain, it is anticipated to thrive.
RareBetSports
RareBetSports is a Web3 sports application aimed at revolutionizing the daily fantasy sports (DFS) gaming experience, allowing users to create their own teams to participate in virtual sports events. This application is highly anticipated within the Monad ecosystem, with key figures like Keone Hon placing great hopes on it.
Sappy Seals x Playember
Sappy Seals, originally an NFT collection, is now collaborating with the game studio Playember to launch a game based on its intellectual property within the Monad ecosystem.
5.4 Culture and Community
Spikynads, Monad Nomads, and Monadians
Spikynads, Monad Nomads, and Monadians are community-driven NFT collections within the Monad ecosystem. These groups have been part of the Monad community since the launch of the testnet in 2023 and are expected to play a significant role in the NFT ecosystem after the mainnet launch.
The Pipeline
The Pipeline is a media team dedicated to delivering new information and updates about the Monad ecosystem. They produce podcasts featuring key members of Monad Labs, such as Keone and Kevin McCordic, and provide essential content support for the Monad community.
Monad Mach
Monad Mach is an accelerator project aimed at supporting project builders within the Monad ecosystem. The MACH 1 program is expected to launch in Q4 2024, providing guidance, funding, and fundraising support for builders developing projects within the Monad ecosystem. Additionally, the project will offer a four-week course covering topics in development, design, and marketing.
These projects and initiatives showcase the rapid and dynamic expansion of the Monad ecosystem, continuing to attract diverse applications and infrastructure. With a solid technological foundation and active community support, the Monad blockchain has a promising outlook for driving innovation and growth in the blockchain space.
6. The Future of Monad
We have explored various aspects of Monad (including the blockchain and labs), and I am impressed that, despite not having launched the mainnet, the project has already achieved significant milestones. Monad has built a community that is more robust than many projects that have already launched their mainnets and tokens. Technically, the Monad blockchain is pushing boundaries that other EVM chains dare not attempt. As mentioned earlier, the strategies employed by the Monad blockchain to build and maintain its community are so exceptional that they could serve as a benchmark for many other projects in the blockchain space. Overall, blockchain technology indicates that both technology and community are crucial, and the Monad blockchain excels in both areas. This suggests that the team at Monad Labs has a profound understanding of the dynamics of blockchain and Web3, making the future of Monad even brighter.
Can the Monad blockchain overcome the limitations of EVM? Can it maintain and further develop its established strong community? While it is impossible to predict the future with certainty, based on the performance of the Monad blockchain thus far, I expect it to carve out new territory as a Layer 1 blockchain, setting new standards in the industry.
As a supporter of monolithic blockchains (note: monolithic blockchains centralize all transactions and data processing on a single blockchain) and an advocate for single-shard optimization, I am excited about the future of the Monad blockchain and will closely follow its development journey.
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