Blockchain technologies flourished at the beginning of 2021 with the price of Bitcoin reaching new heights and NFTs bursting into the world spotlight. And, while Ethereum gas fees continued to constrict the flow of business, new blockchains gained momentum. Civic made bold moves in Q1 by responding to these new market conditions through integration with the Solana blockchain and further developing our identity verification business offering.
Key milestones
In March, we announced our integration with the Solana blockchain, which has been unlocking new opportunities for Civic. We’re proud that Civic — and our nonprofit partner, Identity.com — are paving a better, more sustainable path by leveraging Solana’s blazing speed and low fees that scale as the ecosystem grows.
The move was prompted by soaring Ethereum transaction fees, which have blocked the mainstream adoption of DeFi and squeezed companies that depend on a functional blockchain ecosystem since last summer. With a second layer solution requiring months of development, chain-agnostic Civic has shifted resources to providing an identity gateway for the next generation of blockchain-powered products.
Now, with identity as a cornerstone of blockchain infrastructure, a safer, more sustainable financial ecosystem may develop. And, with our unique expertise in identity-based key management and recovery, Civic will help make financial tools more accessible to mainstream consumers.
We believe that identity will be a necessity for businesses in Solana’s ecosystem in order to comply with global regulations in the near future if DeFi is to truly scale for mainstream consumer adoption. Our new products will offer more privacy and a more secure experience for DeFi products and other application layer technologies.
Buzz about Civic
Our Solana integration announcement took center stage in the first quarter. Identity Review shared a thorough write-up, noting that “Through this new collaboration between Solana and Civic, the fintech industry will take a step toward making financial tools more secure and more accessible to mainstream consumers.”
We also gave a company update outlining the announcement and how we are interpreting the future with emerging technology. In the update, which was open to the Civic community, we had the opportunity to talk about the integration with Solana CEO Anatoly Yakovenko. Most importantly, we talked about why now is the right time to devote resources to integrate with Solana: because markets don’t wait for engineering timelines. This is in reference to the time it will take to build Layer 2 on the Ethereum blockchain. Businesses within the ecosystem need to keep moving their momentum forward.
Earlier, before BTC spiked and NFTs took center stage, we took a broad view of the new year in conversation with Cointelegraph, weighing in on topics such as store of value, central bank digital currencies and what to watch. We also shared commentary in podcasts for Gold Silver Bitcoin and Blockhash.
On the horizon
With new market conditions, the opportunities for identity verification abound. You can expect to hear more news about our Solana integration in the coming months, starting with a consumer-friendly gateway to DeFi on Solana via a wallet experience that enhances the vision started with their mobile app on Ethereum. With the emergence of NFTs, Civic has been actively exploring opportunities to harmonize and secure user experiences.
2021 has already proven to be a disruptive year. We are looking forward to continuing to build on the new opportunities that our directional change has already brought to our doorstep.