The SKALE Network Capitalized with $17.1 Million for Mainnet Launch

SAN FRANCISCO, CA — October 1, 2019 — The SKALE Network, supported by the Node Foundation, a Liechtenstein Foundation, and SKALE Labs, Inc. announced today it has been capitalized with total of $17.1M which includes a contribution from SKALE Labs, Inc. and a recent financing which includes investment from Arrington XRP Capital, Blockchange, ConsenSys Labs, Hashed, HashKey, Multicoin Capital, Recruit Holdings, and Winklevoss Capital.

“PoS networks need global distribution of ownership in order to provide a strong, secure, decentralized foundation to the Network. They also need an array of investors rather than centralization of ownership,” said Jack O’Holleran, CEO of SKALE Labs. “SKALE’s recent financing round brings the total number of VCs and prominent angels to over 40 investors spanning the US, EU, China, Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, and Singapore. This will yield over 750 Nodes live at Network Launch which can support up to 6,000 independent SKALE Chains.”

“SKALE is focused on delivering the high-performance and usability advantages of Sidechains with the pooled security guarantees of larger public chains through elements typically found in sharded layer 1 solutions,” said Konstantin Kladko, CTO of SKALE Labs. “The key components are cryptographically provable randomness powered by BLS signatures, node rotation mechanisms that prevent collusion, and creating incentive structures that promote security and high-performance of the network.”

The SKALE Network is the first of its kind allowing developers the ability to easily provision highly configurable virtualized chains with instant compatibility with Ethereum. With SKALE, dApps can deploy their own blockchain and can configure it to their business requirements whether they are building a game, DeFi application, or anything else. SKALE Chains can execute sub-second block times, run over 2,000 tps on every chain, and run full-state smart contracts in addition to decentralized storage, and machine learning in EVM.

"Over the last year, various scalability technologies have brought thousands of decentralized transactions per second to layer 2, anchored into or bridged into the base Ethereum trust layer. SKALE is presently the state of the art and represents a quantum leap in scalability for the Ethereum ecosystem. Proof of Stake is the future of Ethereum and most other modern protocols and represents the most scalable, energy-efficient and robust mechanism for ensuring validators are fully aligned with the best interests of the platform, broadly. SKALE will help reinforce that tradition," said Joseph Lubin, Founder of ConsenSys and Co-Creator of Ethereum.

"We look forward to the upcoming launch of this powerful new layer-two infrastructure. Even before Ethereum 2.0 is fully released, Ethereum's scalability concerns are being addressed as various platforms bring more bandwidth to applications on Ethereum," said Min Teo, Managing Partner at ConsenSys Labs.

In a strategic move to ensure the SKALE Network is decentralized and open, SKALE Labs has transferred all non-equity funding to the Node Foundation. The Node Foundation is supported by a decentralized set of Network Representatives which are comprised of dApp Developers who run SKALE Chains, Validators who run SKALE Nodes, Independents such as investors that helped kickstart the network economics, and developers/representatives that actively build, maintain, and evolve the codebase.

“SKALE’s modular technology is built to flexibly evolve to address a wide range of critical blockchain scaling needs,” said Michael Arrington, the founder of TechCrunch and  Arrington XRP Capital. “SKALE is built for the multi-blockchain world of the future and has the capacity to run smart-contract-based economies. It is a powerful asset in the Ethereum ecosystem”.

With the support of the Node Foundation and this new injection of funding, SKALE Labs will continue to grow the SKALE Network with a primary focus on the long-term growth of its Proof-of-Stake network. While still maintaining an active role in the development of the blockchain, SKALE Labs is commissioned to do the ongoing network development and community growth.

“SKALE will significantly expand what’s possible on Ethereum blockchain,” said Simon Kim, CEO of Hashed. “SKALE will have an immediate impact on the Asia blockchain market, in particular, games, and DeFi. We are excited to support SKALE growth in Asia and beyond”. Hashed is a SKALE investor and will also participate in the SKALE Network by running validator nodes.

To learn more about SKALE or to become a SKALE validator prior to Mainnet launch validators are encouraged to visit SKALE Website.

About the SKALE Network

The SKALE Network is an elastic, modular network of blockchains built with cutting edge containerization technology and cryptography. The result is an easy-to-use, secure, fast, cost-effective decentralized cloud purpose-built to support the Ethereum ecosystem. The SKALE Network is decentralized and supported by top validators in the world. The decentralized, open network is supported by the NODE Foundation, a non-profit entity based in Vaduz, Liechtenstein. The network is also supported by SKALE Labs, Inc., headquartered in San Francisco, CA. SKALE Labs is commissioned to provide support with engineering, community growth, and other key efforts to facilitate the growth and adoption of the SKALE technology and Ethereum.