What is Komodo?

Ticker: KMD

Consensus mechanism: Delayed Proof of Work (dPoW)

Competition breeds innovation. The blockchain space is saturated with ambition and determination to be the best. The plethora of niches blockchain caters to is remarkable – but all chains compete on a number of key principles:

• Security
• Scalability
• Adaptability
• Interoperability

Above all else, a strong platform is vital. Komodo is just that. Let’s take a look at what makes Komodo a viable contender among competing chains.

What is Komodo?

Komodo is a secure, stable and interoperable blockchain platform and ecosystem providing end-to-end technology solutions. With Komodo, projects can create their own blockchains and host token sales.

Komodo is a fork of Zcash, which means the exciting features that exist in Zcash are also present in the Komodo platform, such as the zero knowledge proof protocol. The Komodo coin is the native currency, denoted by the ticker KMD.

What makes Komodo stand out is how it tackles the key principles outlined above: Security, scalability, adaptability and interoperability. We’ll take a look at each one in turn.

Security and consensus

Komodo utilizes an interesting consensus mechanism called Delayed Proof of Work (dPoW), which latches onto the hash power of Bitcoin to significantly increase network security. This makes perfect sense, as Bitcoin has the most hash power of any blockchain network making it toughest public chain to hijack by far.

Every ten minutes a backup of the Komodo chain is stored on the Bitcoin network. The process is managed by 64 elected, dedicated servers, known as notary nodes. This ensures that even if the Komodo chain is hijacked and changed, the changes won’t be accepted as they won’t be reflected by the backups on the Bitcoin network.

This adds an important additional layer of security that most other projects simply don’t have.

Here’s a great quote from Komodo about this procedure:

"At present, Komodo stores its backups on the Bitcoin blockchain, as it currently has the largest hashrate and would be the most difficult blockchain to hack. So, in order for and dPoW-protected blockchain to be altered, corrupted, or destroyed, both the Komodo network and the Bitcoin network would have to be successfully overpowered at the same time. Under present circumstances, an attack of this nature is essentially infeasible." - source: https://komodoplatform.com/komodo-platforms-new-scalability-tech/

Scalability

If a chain isn’t capable of handling a huge amount of users, it’s going to bottleneck and fail under strain. With Komodo, scalability is a core feature.

The Komodo team has developed a scalability solution that they claim significantly outshines all competition. The scalability solution is anticipated to be able to achieve one million transactions per second, with each transaction capable of containing up to 100 payments, which means in theory Komodo could be processing up to 100 million payments a second.

Big claims - sure. But the neat thing about Komodo is the tech test results are publicly verifiable, they aren’t just blowing hot air. Their scalability achievements are publicly verifiable.

How does it work?

It’s called Multi-Chain Syncing. The process works by taking multiple blockchains that process transactions simultaneously and syncing them together to seamlessly achieve blockchain interoperability.

There’s no limit to the amount of chains that can be a part of this Multi-Chain Syncing process. All of these chains are referred to as “Smart Chains” and they all communicate with the main KMD chain.

Interoperability

Any chain in the Komodo ecosystem can work and communicate with other chains. Why does this matter? It bridges projects together, allowing innovation to spread and projects to flourish.

Cross-Chain Smart Contracts also exist on Komodo with two main aims:

• First, they allow projects to seamlessly expand onto additional chains to increase scalability.
• Second, with Komodo’s Multi-Chain Syncing and Cross-Chain Smart Contracts combined, inter-blockchain transfer of value is possible without performing a swap or trade. Basically, coins on one chain are burned while they are minted on the other.

Therefore, any project built on Komodo can communicate with every other Smart Chain via the KMD chain. This is important because it allows projects to verify transactions that occurred anywhere within the ecosystem.

Atomic swaps

Komodo built AtomicDEX, a decentralized exchange that facilitates Atomic swaps. Atomic swaps are peer-to-peer cryptocurrency trades that exchange two different coins directly from one user to another, wallet to wallet.

Komodo was the first project to bridge the gap between Bitcoin-based coins and ERC-20 tokens. Prior to this, a user would have had to trade a BTC-based altcoin to Bitcoin and then to the ERC-20 token.

With Komodo’s atomic swap on AtomicDEX, a user can swap directly from a BTC-based altcoin to an ERC-20 token, or vice versa. AtomicDEX currently supports atomic swaps for over 95% of all coins and tokens in existence - a level of interoperability that no other exchange has.

Adaptability

One piece of technology cannot meet every need. That’s why Komodo is adaptable to the needs of a project.

Each project can have its own customizable, independent blockchain. Total-coin supply, pre-mine choices, hashing algorithm, block rewards, block halving times, optional private transactions, and more can all be customized.

Beyond that, Komodo has a number of powerful plug-and-play modules that any project can utilize and apply, if they so wish.

All of Komodo’s technology is open-source. The entire blockchain industry can share the innovation. Also, anyone can check the code, conduct a security audit and see what’s going on.

The KMD token

The utility of a token is what matters to an investor. So, what can KMD do for you?

For starters, the KMD token is integral to the entire network due to the dPoW consensus mechanism. The consensus mechanism wouldn’t be able to function without a cryptocurrency.

Holding more than 10 KMD in a wallet will generate an ‘Active User Reward’ at a rate of 5%.

As the network expands and more tools are built on it, KMD usage will grow.