Anurag Arjun, one of the co-founders of Avail, recently sat down for an exclusive interview with Cryptonews to discuss the rebranding of Matic to Polygon and the establishment of Avail as a provider of infrastructure for the future of cryptocurrency. According to Arjun, the future of blockchain lies in rollups, and he believes that we will see many more of them in the near future. To support this development, Avail is currently working on two crucial components: the data availability layer, known as Avail DA, and the unification layer, called Nexus.
Arjun explained that when the team started working on the Matic Network in 2017, it was a much smaller project compared to what Polygon is now. They faced numerous challenges due to limited resources and funding. However, in 2020, they rebranded Matic to Polygon and expanded their focus beyond the Proof-of-Stake chain. They also started working on Avail and crafting their ZK rollup strategy. Despite the rebranding, the MATIC token still carries its original name due to the complexities involved in changing it.
Arjun emphasized that the construction of blockchains is going to change significantly, with rollups becoming the dominant method. He recognized the need for a solution to the problem of data availability, especially in off-chain scaling solutions like rollups. Ethereum’s roadmap also supports this shift towards rollups. Rollups are essentially Layer-2 scaling solutions that process transactions away from the main blockchain. They allow for one base layer and multiple rollups built on top of it, inheriting the security of the base layer.
Avail aims to provide the infrastructure to power this rollup-centric future. The team developed Avail DA, which will soon be launched on the mainnet. Avail DA ensures that rollups have access to a base layer with sufficient data availability, throughput, and verifiability. Arjun mentioned Ethereum’s roadmap, including Danksharding, which addresses data availability and throughput issues. However, Avail already has Avail DA in place, which implements data availability sampling with a validity proof-based approach.
To address the issue of UX fragmentation, Avail is building Avail Nexus, a high-level interoperability layer that connects different rollups. This layer creates a shared notion of validity between the rollups, enabling seamless communication and transactions. With Avail Nexus, users won’t have to worry about the underlying chain infrastructure and can move between different chains effortlessly.
In conclusion, Arjun believes that the future of cryptocurrency requires a unification layer to overcome the challenges posed by a rollup-centric architecture. Avail aims to provide this unification layer through Avail Nexus, connecting various rollups and eliminating the fragmentation experienced by users. The MVP version of Avail Nexus will showcase the connection between a Polygon zkEVM chain and a zkSync chain, allowing for cross-chain transactions.
During the interview, Arjun also discussed his work on Plasma in 2017, the co-founding of Matic Network/Polygon, the limitations of Layer 1 blockchains, and the upcoming developments for Avail.