From: thepipeline_xyz
Monad is a new layer-1 blockchain being developed by Monad Labs, aiming to significantly enhance the performance and capabilities of the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) [00:00:46]. The project began in early 2022 with a core mission to address fundamental execution stack challenges that other scaling blockchain ecosystems had not prioritized [00:01:51].
Core Mission and Approach
Keone, CEO of Monad Labs, emphasizes that the primary goal is to make EVM execution much more performant [00:02:01]. This involves:
- Introducing optimizations like parallel execution [00:02:12].
- Developing a high-performance state database that stores data in a Merkel tree, supporting many parallel reads and writes [00:02:22].
- Addressing other bottlenecks within the Ethereum Virtual Machine [00:02:31].
At the time of Monad’s inception, there was a relative lack of focus on the execution stack compared to efforts in rollups, zero-knowledge proofs, or data availability [00:02:42]. Monad believes that improving this aspect of blockchain scaling is crucial, especially for the EVM, which remains the dominant standard for smart contracts, holding 98% of total value locked (TVL) in crypto [00:03:03]. The challenge of making the EVM more performant is also seen as an “interesting and challenging problem” akin to climbing a mountain “because it was there” [00:03:29].
Kevin G, leading developer relations at Monad Labs, found Monad exciting because it takes a “fundamentals first principles approach” to the problem [00:04:03]. Many of Monad’s strategies apply “best practices” from 30 years of high-performance computing to a blockchain, unlike other areas still in theoretical stages [00:04:21].
Team and Expertise
Monad Labs comprises approximately 25 people, a size that might surprise some for a layer-1 project [00:06:14]. This lean structure reflects a commitment to staying incredibly laser-focused on core problems [00:06:28]. The engineering team predominantly consists of individuals with extensive experience building high-performance, low-latency systems [00:07:16]. Building a performant base layer system like a database (which the Monad blockchain partly is) requires expertise across the entire system’s performance, sometimes necessitating kernel-level optimizations [00:07:29].
Keone’s background in high-frequency trading and Kevin’s in low-level systems engineering (from companies like Qualcomm and Apple) provide foundational experience in optimizing systems for speed and efficiency [00:00:52].
Value Propositions for Builders
Monad offers compelling advantages for developers:
- Enhanced Composability: Monad enables deep composability, significantly beyond limitations seen in other blockchains (e.g., Solana’s CPI depth of three) [00:09:24]. The EVM’s design allows for nearly infinite call depth, and Monad removes practical gas-related limits that hinder features like account abstraction [00:09:42].
- Cost Efficiency: By reducing gas costs, Monad eliminates cost-prohibitive barriers for complex dApps, allowing developers to implement richer functionality without worrying about excessive fees [00:09:58].
- EVM Flexibility: As an L1, Monad has the flexibility to introduce new opcodes (e.g., for BLS pre-compiles) and other features that enable new use cases like base-layer privacy or private smart contracts, without breaking backward compatibility [00:10:49].
- Unlocking Untapped Design Space: The EVM ecosystem has a wealth of proven, solid existing code and products (e.g., ERC standards) that Monad’s performance allows developers to compose and build upon, enabling “money Legos” to truly flourish [00:14:49]. This opens up new possibilities for NFTs with in-protocol royalty enforcement or loyalty tracking, which are currently too expensive to implement broadly on existing chains [00:17:03].
- New Use Cases: Monad envisions applications like event ticketing (where tickets are NFTs) [00:17:55], mass-adopted DeFi products (money markets, decentralized exchanges, high-fidelity oracles) that can replace centralized incumbents [00:21:14], and consumer-facing apps like sports betting, on-chain casinos, and social applications [00:22:59].
- Data Sovereignty: Kevin G is excited about the potential for context-aware internet experiences where user data resides securely in their wallet. This enables personalized app experiences (like Amazon showing relevant products based on history) but on-chain, requiring high throughput and low fees due to the large amount of data involved [00:23:31].
Monad is essentially an acceleration of Ethereum’s original concept, enabling anyone to truly build anything without the practical gas constraints that have limited the EVM for over a decade [00:13:13].
Comparison to Solana and EVM Focus
Monad’s team has prior experience in the Solana ecosystem [00:21:46]. While Solana offers impressive performance and low fees, its non-EVM compatibility creates a trickier developer experience [00:22:50]. Monad chose the EVM route to support the highest number of developers by going where they already are and solving their pressing problems [00:25:55].
Kevin G highlights that Monad offers a path for the ideals of the EVM and Ethereum community to reach “product scale” [00:27:50]. Monad aims to allow EVM apps to sit side-by-side with Solana apps, offering similar user experiences, making developer choice dependent on system needs rather than a limited set of options [00:28:30].
Monad benefits from the robust EVM research community, particularly in ZK research [00:31:31]. By scaling the base layer, Monad can leverage existing developer tooling and quickly adopt innovations like fully stateless blockchains if they emerge from research, without needing to rebuild everything from scratch [00:31:47].
Challenges for Builders and Monad’s Solutions
Current challenges for builders in the EVM environment include:
- Funding: It remains challenging to attract funding, especially for international builders due to a US-biased investor community [00:33:03].
- Security: Building decentralized applications is inherently more challenging from a security perspective due to constant probing by black-hat hackers [00:33:38].
- Gas Costs vs. Security: Developers currently face a trade-off between including additional defensive assertions (which cost more gas) and saving on fees [00:34:11]. Monad’s reduced gas costs will allow developers to prioritize security without prohibitive expenses [00:34:06].
Monad acknowledges the strength of the crypto community, which provides eager early adopters, unlike traditional tech startups [00:35:17]. To encourage Web2 developers, Monad aims to present examples of real use cases with UI/UX similar to Web2 applications, demonstrating that the technology has matured [00:36:00]. The goal is to make blockchain development feel like “just building an app” [00:37:48], allowing developers to focus on unique experiences and value propositions.
Future Vision and User Acquisition
Monad believes that the next bull market will bring a surge of new builders [00:38:07]. The key is to have the right infrastructure to support these builders in creating apps that can scale to many users while remaining decentralized [00:38:33].
Initially, Monad’s unique approach to blockchain performance will differentiate it [00:39:10]. Over time, as other systems improve, Monad will continue to push the limits of what’s possible by introducing new behaviors, pre-compiles, opcodes, and integrations [00:39:36]. In 5-10 years, Monad’s differentiation will stem from its community, killer apps, evolving research community, and unwavering commitment to technological advancement while maintaining a high degree of decentralization [00:40:06].
Monad’s primary focus for user acquisition is on bringing new users into crypto, rather than simply attracting existing users from Ethereum [00:42:43]. The team believes that growing the overall pie of blockchain users is essential for any high-performance blockchain to achieve full block utilization [00:42:52]. This requires delivering compelling use cases with killer apps and collaborating with other teams on better wallets, user experiences, and fiat on-ramps to ease the onboarding process [00:43:37].
TPS Measurement and Performance Benchmarking
The discussion around Transactions Per Second (TPS) can be confusing due to non-uniform measurement practices across different blockchains [00:48:50]. Keone clarifies that Solana’s advertised TPS often includes validator votes (about 2500 per second) in addition to actual user transactions (around 500 per second) [00:47:16].
Monad’s approach to TPS measurement will focus solely on “real” transactions, such as smart contract interactions and transfers, excluding votes [00:48:21]. Other systems, like Aptos, might count a single smart contract invocation with multiple sub-instructions as many transactions, further distorting figures [00:48:57].
A key challenge in comparing performance is distinguishing between a system’s current transaction load (demand) and its maximum possible throughput (capacity) [00:49:39]. Testnet performance can also be misleading if it doesn’t accurately reflect production environments [00:50:14].
Monad advocates for reproducible benchmarks with publicly available GitHub repositories, allowing anyone to deploy servers globally and run scripts to verify transaction throughput tests [00:50:51]. This scientific approach ensures transparency and verifiability of performance claims [00:51:27].
Kevin G adds that transactions themselves can be “sized” differently across systems. While simple transfers are a good benchmark, real-world activities vary greatly. A better, more abstract metric might be “raw bytes per second” to account for varying transaction payloads [00:51:47]. Monad plans to benchmark against historical Ethereum transaction history as a proxy for real-world activity [00:52:53].