As the blockchain industry continues to grow, simplifying processes and reducing barriers to entry will become increasingly important for developers to onboard new users. We recently caught up with Mayur Relekar, co-founder of Arcana Network, to discuss chain abstraction and Arcana’s innovative approach to simplifying the blockchain user experience.
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What major pain point does Arcana’s Chain Abstraction protocol aim to solve for Web3 users?
If a user wants to use an app on any chain, they must ensure that they have the necessary means to interact with that app, whether for assets or gas costs, on the specific chain on which the app is built . Normally this includes everything from waiting, context switching, to performing a nonsensical number of transactions… just to be able to use an app. This leads to poor user experience and fragmentation of user liquidity.
With the advent of the modular chain thesis and the burgeoning ecosystem that accompanies it, the above-mentioned problem will only become worse. This is what we want to solve here at Arcana.
Can you explain how the protocol improves capital efficiency and transaction speeds for users?
Let’s say a user wants to use an app in a particular chain, but doesn’t have any assets or gas tokens needed in the specific chain to interact with this app, but holds it in another chain(s).
“Our solution meets the user’s liquidity needs on that specific chain almost immediately and connects to the user post facto. This, as you can see, dramatically improves the time to first interaction for the user.”
Mayur Relekar, co-founder of Arcana Network
Furthermore, a careful study of various chains and the bridging solutions that support those chains shows that for every dollar bridged in a given chain, a very large percentage of that is bridged. Thus, the users’ liquidity needs already exist in the user’s target chain.
By netting the movement of funds in and out of all these chains and leveraging existing liquidity on target chains, we can make significant gains in capital efficiency, which can ultimately lead to cheaper transactions for users.
What unique advantages does Arcana’s Chain Abstraction module offer over its competitors?
A good chain abstraction solution should consider significant gains in user experience, developer experience, and capital efficiency. Otherwise, it simply fails to overcome the existing inertia among crypto natives and be easy to use for new people entering the space.
Our approach is not only aimed at improving user experience and capital efficiency as mentioned above, but also aims to ensure that developers’ integration requirements make the footprint extremely low for them, leading them to focus on their core value proposition and the overall improvement in the quality of the apps in the space.
How does the new offering fit into Arcana’s broader mission and product ecosystem?
The Chain Abstraction Protocol builds on Arcana’s mission to make Web3 navigation effortless by abstracting its inherent complexity. It complements Arcana’s existing products such as Arcana Auth (which provides seamless social login for wallets), SendIt (which allows users to send crypto via email to anyone, even those who don’t have a wallet), and Gasless SDK (which handles gas costs seamlessly), delivering a truly unified and frictionless experience.
Can you tell us about the timeline for the rollout of the protocol?
We plan to roll out the Chain Abstraction protocol in multiple phases in Q3 and Q4 2024, with multiple testnets and mainnets as we launch our Modular Layer 1. This phased approach will ensure a smooth and safe transition to the new protocol. allowing for rigorous auditing, testing and gradual adoption by developers and users.
What are some key use cases that could be enabled or improved by Arcana’s unified cross-chain ecosystem?
Chain abstraction is a revolutionary concept in the crypto space and its long tail has the ability to eventually unlock mass adoption. Being able to afford users to spend assets, for liquidity or gas, is useful in literally all cases of crypto use.
Specifically, you can imagine things like seamless in-game asset transfers that could be facilitated between gaming projects built on different chains. Users of DeFi apps like DEXs can also easily tap into multi-chain liquidity. Similarly, NFT marketplaces can offer a comprehensive inventory across multiple chains without users having to manually bridge assets. The possibilities are basically endless.
How does Arcana approach its security and decentralization?
Security and decentralization are at the core of our overarching vision. Expanding on this further, the protocol is secured by staking $XAR on Arcana’s proprietary modular AI-powered Layer 1 blockchain, further enhanced by a new Dual Staking mechanism that uses a staking platform such as EigenLayer.
The decentralized MPC network provides a reliable way to co-sign transactions without custody risks. User self-management of assets is never compromised during cross-chain operations.
Can you explain how the Chain Abstraction protocol can/will impact the user experience for Web3 applications?
To this day, one of the biggest barriers to mass adoption of Web3 technologies is the poor user onboarding experience – often fraught with complex wallet setup and cross-chain asset management.
“Our offering eliminates these bottlenecks by allowing users to easily log in with their existing Web2 credentials and have all their Web3 assets immediately accessible, without any chain issues.”
Mayur Relekar, co-founder of Arcana Network
This radically lowers the barrier to entry, allowing Web3 applications to reach the next billion users.
What are Arcana’s plans for future expansion and integration with other blockchain ecosystems?
Although Arcana initially focused on EVM-compatible chains, it has ambitions to expand its capabilities to other major blockchain ecosystems such as Cosmos, Solana, etc.
How can developers and projects get involved in Arcana’s Chain Abstraction ecosystem?
We are committed to an open, collaborative approach. That’s why we’re launching a developer incentive program soon. Additionally, we will also host a number of hackathons and community initiatives to drive wider adoption.
Projects can integrate the protocol with minimal effort and start tapping into Arcana’s growing user base from day one. Developers are also invited to contribute to Arcana’s open-source codebases and shape the future of user-centric Web3 infrastructure.