cLabs CTO Marek Olszewski on why Celo wants to ‘come home’ to Ethereum

Marek Olszewski, co-founder of Celo and CTO of cLabs, mentioned that the event of Layer 2 options has enabled Celo’s plan to combine again into the Ethereum ecosystem.

Born from the imaginative and prescient of constructing an easy-to-use cell pockets on Ethereum, Celo advanced into its personal EVM-compatible and scalability-focused Layer 1 blockchain in 2020. “On the time, Ethereum’s scalability plans had been evolving and the quickest technique to construct a scalable EVM chain that builders had been demanding was to launch as a Layer 1,” Olszewski mentioned. Nevertheless, with Ethereum’s scalability roadmap by way of rollups now in place, Olszewski sees it as an opportune second for Celo to “come house” and proceed its mission as half of a bigger Ethereum scaling initiative.

“We noticed this as a coming house second, one thing the Celo group has been interested by for some time that hadn’t been attainable till latest Layer 2 analysis developments corresponding to EigenDA — the Ethereum aligned information availability protocol — making it attainable for Celo to keep up its low gasoline charges as a Layer 2,” Olszewski added.

Ethereum migration proposals and ‘Celo 2.0’ plans

cLabs, the a16z-backed core developer behind the Celo blockchain, proposed migrating its community from an impartial Layer 1 to a Layer 2 constructed on Ethereum in July, leveraging Optimism’s OP Stack. Polygon Labs later proposed Celo may migrate to an Ethereum Layer 2 by way of the Polygon CDK in September, when zkSync developer Matter Labs additionally proposed Celo turned an Ethereum Layer 2 utilizing its ZK Stack.

“Whereas cLabs’ preliminary proposal sought to leverage OP Stack, the group has not but selected which stack to maneuver ahead with. Along with OP Stack, the group is researching and evaluating numerous proposals which were put ahead by numerous tasks, together with Polygon Labs and Matter Labs,” Olszewski mentioned. “cLabs goals to supply as a lot info as attainable to assist the group decide quickly. To take action, we’re publishing a framework within the coming weeks to assist take advantage of technically sound selection with out compromising our group and ecosystem’s wants.”

As a part of the “Celo 2.0” roadmap, cLabs plans to improve Celo to a extremely scalable validium-based zk-EVM, Olszewski defined. But it surely additionally needs to keep up some distinctive function set corresponding to the power to pay for transaction charges with ERC-20 tokens — made attainable following developments in next-generation zk-SNARK proving techniques.

Taking the leap to turn into an Ethereum Layer 2

Celo just isn’t the one one contemplating a transition to turn into an Ethereum Layer 2, with a number of blockchain tasks, together with Canto, Immutable and Astar, collaborating with Polygon Labs for his or her migration plans and exemplifying a rising development within the house.

“For many EVM-compatible chains, it is more and more laborious to justify a standalone positioning in a market the place the Ethereum scaling roadmap is proving itself,” Olszewski argued.

“A part of it’s because builders are desirous about constructing on Ethereum, and within the absence of scaling limits that beforehand despatched them to different EVM-compatible Layer 1s, which means constructing on Layer 2s,” he mentioned. “We have seen some chains flirt with the concept of transitioning to a Layer 2 with out actually committing to it. I feel that can change as extra tasks get the braveness to completely take the leap.”

A mobile-first strategy

Influenced by Celo’s cell pockets origins, a mobile-first strategy is core to the undertaking — one thing it sees as very important in reaching mass adoption of blockchain expertise.

“An estimated 6.9 billion folks, or 86% of the world’s inhabitants, personal a smartphone, whereas entry to desktop computer systems is way much less widespread,” Olszewski mentioned. “Cellphones permit on a regular basis folks to leapfrog expertise — which is why making web3 extra universally accessible to a mainstream viewers requires constructing mobile-first experiences.”

“Once we efficiently transition to a Layer 2, our mobile-first strategy, which we’ve carried out since genesis, will additional assist onboard customers with entry and effectivity in thoughts,” he added.

The ‘house of ReFi’

Celo additionally aligns itself with the Regenerative Finance (ReFi) ecosystem — aiming to additional sustainable and inclusive monetary practices, with Olszewski describing Celo because the “house of ReFi.”

The Celo co-founder mentioned its “Ultragreen Cash” initiative demonstrated Celo’s dedication to sustainability. This initiative builds on Ethereum’s fee-burning mechanism to make the CELO token deflationary and ship 20% of transaction charges to a brand new Carbon Offset Fund.

The ReFi ecosystem helps numerous tasks, starting from Common Primary Revenue (UBI) distribution protocols like GoodDollar to environmental restoration efforts like Plastiks and accessible, low-cost monetary instruments corresponding to MiniPay’s ultralight stablecoin pockets, constructed by Opera in collaboration with the Celo Basis, Olszewski added.