Latest news with #PolygonLabs
Time of India
11-06-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Polygon cofounder Sandeep Nailwal takes over as CEO amid restructuring
Sandeep Nailwal , cofounder of blockchain firm Polygon, will take over as the chief executive officer of Polygon Foundation , which includes Polygon Labs , as the company undergoes restructuring. The company, which was started in 2017 to solve the scaling issues of blockchain Ethereum , has been facing challenges in the last couple of years. It saw the exodus of co-founders, Jayant Kanani, Anurag Arjun, and Mihailo Bjelic, along with the exit of Ryan Wyatt, former CEO of Polygon Labs. The company had strengthened its US team, which created friction between the India and US teams, ET had earlier reported. The firm has been facing increasing competition from other players such as Coinbase's Base and Optimism, even as it saw most of its cofounders leave the firm. As a part of the restructuring, the company will focus on launching the AggLayer, short for aggregation layer, a blockchain protocol that facilitates interoperability between chains by FY25. It will shut down zkEVM, on the back of development hurdles. In a statement, the company said that the product lacked a strong strategic position and was no longer aligned with the evolving needs of the ecosystem. Other changes include Polygon PoS, which is now Gigagas, and will handle 100,000 transactions per second. The press statement said that the firm has processed $514 billion in stablecoin transactions in the past year and $3.7 billion in peer-to-peer (P2P) volume in April 2025. Discover the stories of your interest Blockchain 5 Stories Cyber-safety 7 Stories Fintech 9 Stories E-comm 9 Stories ML 8 Stories Edtech 6 Stories The company said that organisations such as Stripe, Reliance Jio, Nexo and BlindPay have built solutions on its blockchain.
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Business Standard
11-06-2025
- Business
- Business Standard
Polygon appoints Sandeep Nailwal as CEO, signals founder-led reboot
In a strategic shift, Polygon, an L2 blockchain platform, has announced that Sandeep Nailwal has been appointed chief executive officer of the Polygon Foundation. In this role, Nailwal will focus on long-term strategy, oversee key ecosystem initiatives, and ensure that the Polygon Foundation—which supervises Polygon Labs and other entities—decisively steers the project towards exponential growth, sharper focus, and greater value delivery to the Polygon ecosystem, including users, applications, and POL stakers. 'At our beginnings, Polygon was all about bold execution and big goals. During 2021–23, we made a real effort to institutionalise the project by onboarding some amazing people as co-founders, setting up a board, and undergoing a period of intense tech research and exploration. Now, it is time to again move fast, aggressively, and with full conviction and focus,' said Sandeep Nailwal. With Nailwal's move to the Polygon Foundation, Marc Boiron will be chief executive of Polygon Labs and will continue to guide the organisation's strategic vision and drive execution. Mudit Gupta was recently named chief technology officer, and Ryan Niedzialek—a long-time Polygon Labs executive—is now serving as chief operating officer, overseeing business development, partner enablement, and core operational functions. Nailwal's immediate priorities include a product-first approach to rapidly launch a full-featured Agglayer, a transformative roadmap to evolve Polygon PoS into the high-throughput GigaGAS chain capable of supporting over 100,000 transactions per second for payments and real-world assets (RWAs), expansion of the Agglayer Breakout Programme, the sunset of Polygon zkEVM, and renewed engagement with market makers to reinforce support for POL and ensure liquidity across decentralised and centralised exchanges. The company said these moves represent a clear shift from a more passive phase in Polygon's history to a focused and ambitious founder-led vision for the future. Nailwal added, 'With a world-class team in place and the Foundation under my leadership, we are fully aligned on our strategy and what matters most—building amazing products and delivering real value to POL stakers. That starts with my plan for several key priorities: completing Agglayer to become the trustless interoperability layer of Web3, evolving Polygon PoS to dominate payments and real-world assets, and empowering our founders to launch independent, high-impact projects through the Agglayer Breakout Programme. With focused leadership, this is the moment to scale the next chapter of Polygon.' This strategic move marks a defining moment for the Polygon ecosystem—one rooted in clarity of vision, decisive leadership, and a commitment to long-term value creation, the company said. With Agglayer nearing full launch, Polygon PoS evolving into a leading platform for payments and RWAs, and a new wave of founder-led projects expanding the network, the Foundation is doubling down on what has always set Polygon apart: speed, innovation, and alignment with its community.
Crypto Insight
29-05-2025
- Business
- Crypto Insight
Polygon-backed, high-yield blockchain launches for institutional adoption
The Katana Foundation, a nonprofit focused on decentralized finance (DeFi) development, is launching its private mainnet, aiming to unlock greater crypto asset productivity via deeper liquidity and higher yields for users. The Katana Foundation launched a DeFi-optimized, private blockchain, Katana, on May 28, incubated by GSR Markets and Polygon Labs, with the public mainnet launch set for June. The new blockchain will enable users to earn higher yields and explore DeFi in a 'unique, optimized yield environment' that unlocks latent value through an ecosystem that makes every digital asset 'work harder,' according to an announcement shared with Cointelegraph. 'DeFi users deserve ecosystems that prioritize sustainable liquidity and consistent 'real' yields,' wrote Marc Boiron, the CEO of Polygon Labs and core contributor at Katana, adding: 'Katana's user-centric model turns inefficiencies into advantages, establishing a truly positive-sum environment for builders and participants alike.' Katana aims to solve the crypto industry's liquidity fragmentation issue, which can cause significant price slippage, as one of the main barriers limiting institutional DeFi participation To reduce the value slippage in DeFi, Katana's blockchain concentrates the liquidity from numerous protocols and collects yields on all potential sources to create an ecosystem with deeper liquidity and more predictable lending and borrowing rates. Institutional participation in DeFi is set to triple over the next two years to 75% from 24% of 350 surveyed institutional investors, according to management consulting firm EY-Parthenon. To tackle the growing institutional liquidity needs, Katana's liquidity pool is composed of multiple protocols, including lending protocol Morpho, decentralized exchange (DEX) Sushi and perpetual DEX Vertex, enabling users to trade 'blue-chip assets' without needing crosschain transfers. Katana has also incorporated Conduit's sequences and Chainlink's decentralized oracle network. Katana to compound DeFi yield from 'Ethereum-based opportunities' Katana aims to boost sustainable yield by building a cohesive DeFi ecosystem. For instance, VaultBridge deploys bridged assets into overcollateralized, curated lending strategies on Ethereum via Mopho to earn yield, which is routed back and compounded on Katana. The protocol will reinvest network fees and a portion of application revenue back into its ecosystem. 'This reduces reliance on short-term incentives, generates consistent yield, and as it grows, acts as an increasingly stable backstop during periods of volatility and liquidity shocks,' Polygon Labs' Boiron told Cointelegraph, adding: 'Yield is distributed pro-rata to each chain using VaultBridge protocol based on their share of total deposits into VaultBridge.' 'So if Katana supplies 20% of the total vault deposits, it receives 20% of the yield back,' he added. Katana will subsequently allocate its share of yield to users through boosted DeFi incentives across 'core apps' such as Sushi, Morpho or Vertex. The yield is generated from 'Ethereum-based opportunities and then enhanced through Katana's core applications,' said Boiron. Polygon Labs' CEO previously criticized DeFi protocols for fueling a cycle of 'mercenary capital' by offering sky-high annual percentage yields (APYs) through token emissions. Beyond infrastructure-related limitations, regulatory uncertainty remains another significant barrier to institutional DeFi adoption. Regulatory concerns were the main barrier to entry, flagged by 57% of institutional investors as the main reason for not planning to participate in DeFi activities. Source:
Yahoo
29-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Katana Foundation launches a private DeFi blockchain
The Katana Foundation has introduced a new private blockchain that enhances the decentralized finance (DeFi) user experience by providing greater liquidity and higher user yields. The Katana mainnet, the private version, is now live, with a public launch expected in June. Katana, under the support of Polygon Labs and GSR Markets, combines several decentralized finance solutions to guide users in earning more with their digital assets and mitigating one of the most substantial challenges in capital markets: fragmented liquidity. This is important because fragmented liquidity often leaves users vulnerable to price slippage, which can impact overall returns, particularly for institutional users. By bringing together liquidity from multiple DeFi protocols, such as lending protocol Morpho, decentralized exchange Sushi, or perpetual DEX Vertex, Katana will provide users with access to trade blue-chip assets with greater liquidity and efficiency. Katana is leveraging Chainlink oracles and Conduit's sequencing tools for accurate asset price maintenance. Katana has a tool known as VaultBridge, which converts the user's assets into Ethereum lending positions to generate interest that is transferred back and compounded on Katana's platform. Another aspect of Katana's model is using a portion of network fees and some app revenues, rather than short-term rewards, to help reinforce the ecosystem. These elements work to build a sustainable and reliable investment strategy that protects users in down markets. "Katana turns inefficiencies into advantages," Marc Boiron, CEO of Polygon Labs, stated. He is confident that Katana now provides both developers and users in the DeFi world with a more consistent and productive ecosystem. Katana Foundation launches a private DeFi blockchain first appeared on TheStreet on May 28, 2025 Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Polygon Labs and market maker GSR launch DeFi-focused blockchain
Polygon Labs became a darling of the 2021 and 2022 crypto boom when it partnered with corporate stalwarts like Starbucks and Meta on various blockchain projects. But, as those brand-name companies quietly dropped their experiments amid the ensuing 'Crypto Winter,' Polygon Labs searched for other ways to popularize its network. On Wednesday, the company, along with the crypto market making firm GSR, announced the launch of the newest blockchain it's helped incubate: Katana. Instead of catering towards corporate clients, Katana is aimed at 'degens'—crypto slang for traders with a high appetite for risk who often use DeFi, or decentralized finance, platforms. Those platforms offer decentralized versions of traditional banking services like lending and borrowing. Rather than borrowing money from JPMorgan Chase, for example, DeFi users borrow from a decentralized pool of funds fronted by other crypto traders. Katana is the latest sign from Polygon Labs, founded in 2017 and one of the marquee companies of the last crypto cycle, that the firm is more explicitly focusing on crypto traders rather than brand names. Polygon's tie-ups with Meta, which focused on NFTs, and Starbucks, which built out a blockchain-based loyalty program, attracted widespread acclaim from the crypto industry in 2022. But, in 2023 and 2024, the two Fortune 500 companies abandoned their experiments with the blockchain company, respectively. Since then, Polygon Labs has built out its DeFi team, and Marc Boiron, the CEO of the company, has even branded himself 'the degen CEO' on X. 'The key is: What are people actually doing on chain, rather than what looks good because it's a big name?' Boiron told Fortune. And what users are doing 'on chain,' or on blockchains, are trading, lending, and borrowing. To that end, Katana has brought on Morpho, a decentralized borrowing and lending protocol; Sushi, which lets users swap and buy cryptocurrencies; and Vertex, an application for trading crypto futures, or bets on the upcoming prices of cryptocurrencies. Boiron said that Katana's biggest differentiator is how it prioritizes its core DeFi applications over competitors. On other blockchains, user funds may be split, for example, across several competing lending and borrowing applications. When funds are divided, users face markets where prices rise or fall abruptly in a matter of seconds. Katana, a layer-2 blockchain on Ethereum, aims to combat this through incentivizing only a handful of DeFi applications in its ecosystem. To do this, the blockchain will distribute fees generated from users on the protocol back to the users of its preferred DeFi applications—among other incentives. The blockchain is currently open to select users and will go public in late June. This story was originally featured on
