The second largest cryptocurrency on the market, Ethereum, and the Foundation behind it released a roadmap for Ethereum’s development for 2019. The roadmap document reveals what has been allocated for research and development purposes and when the ETH updates will be scheduled for release.
The first key point, outlined in the report, explains that the Ethereum Foundation holds less than 1% of the global ETH supply. Plans are being made for cutting on the Foundation`s ETH possession. The smaller the percentage that is with the Foundation, the more decentralized the ETH will be as a cryptocurrency.
According to a blog post on Ethereum.org, the Ethereum Foundation is a tool for connecting Ethereum and the outside world, rather than creating a centralized ecosystem around it. The key philosophy points about the Foundation’s moves in 2019 are creating opportunities, pushing out resources to valuable for the ecosystem projects, and provision of a greater decentralization.
A milestone in Ethereum’s future development is the ETH 2.0, with Proof-of-Stake mechanism applied to its protocol. Ethereum Foundation supports several ETH 2.0 projects, including Sigma Prime, Substrate Shaper, and Nimbus. The teams behind ETH 2.0’s development have a long way to go before the final version, but testnets for Nimbus, Sigma Prime and Prysm are live, awaiting a multi-client testnets in the following months.
Another core element of Ethereum Foundation’s roadmap is to improve short-term scalability and a smoother transition to ETH 2.0. Projects like Geth and Solidity are giving Ethereum the much-needed updates for faster transactions and a secure ecosystem.
As of resource allocation, Ethereum Foundation plans to invest $30 million into crucial for the ecosystem projects. From the $30 million budget, $12 million are allocated for migrating Ethereum to version 2.0 and improving the academic involvement into the project.
Projects like Geth, Solidity, Web3.js, and Ether.js will receive up to $8 million for innovations under the “ETH 1.x” code name. Another $3 million will be set aside for developer growth and awareness. This includes developer educations, devcons, hackathon organizations, and marketing initiatives.
Shortly after the publication, Ethereum’s price jumped to $260 but settled at the $255 support zone. As of press time, Ethereum is trading at $252,80, with over $12 billion in daily trading volume. The gains are also slowly eliminating the consequences of the drop from last week.