With Cardano, another new player appears to have entered the market which is presenting himself as the challenger of Ethereum and Bitcoin. Cardano entered the top 10 of the cryptocurrency's in no time and left behind massive coins like NEM and NEO. Where does this currency suddenly come from and is the hype right?
What is Cardano?
Cardano is the first crypto-coin that is based on proven mathematical theories. The cryptocurrency has been made by academic mathematical research that has been tested by many different academics. The universities of Athens, Edinburgh, and Connecticut have contributed to this. The name Cardano comes from the mathematician Girolamo Cardano. This man was one of the most influential mathematicians alive during the Renaissance and has brought many revolutionary mathematical theories into the world.
Proven technology
But what makes this cryptocurrency special and what problems does it solve? One of the biggest problems that Charles Hoskinson, none other than the former CEO and founder of Ethereum, saw in the crypto world was the fact that crypto-startups were far too hasty to release their whitepaper. They wanted to raise a lot of money as quickly as possible to find out that a large part of the promises was impossible to meet. This problem already existed for two years for the major ICO hype of 2017 and had since then only become bigger. Hoskinson wants to prevent this with Cardano and explains the basis of the cryptocurrency in the following way:
"Let's do things like we're real academics. Let's start writing good whitepapers with domain experts, let's review the texts, let's discuss important discussions. How can we be good engineers engaged in code that must be completely safe and at the same time good researchers who do things as academics have been doing for a long time? The balance between them is the basis of the Cardano project. "
Formal Verification
The big difference between Cardano and other cryptocurrency is that smart contracts are processed by "formal verification." Right now, in the crypto world, smart contracts are written informally, thrown into the world and tested in this way whether it works or not. Formal verification works differently. It works in the same way and with the same certainty as mathematicians can test their mathematical theories - to indicate how important this form of testing is: thanks to mathematical theories we already know much more of the world than we can see with the eye. For example, when we were not able to get into space for a long time, we could already measure with great certainty that the earth was round, how large the earth was and how far the moon of our planet was, all based on mathematics.
Cardano's self-developed consensus algorithm: Ouroboros
Cardano is very committed to safety and wants to be the most secure crypto platform in existence. For this reason, they use the Haskell programming language, which is one of the most secure programming languages at the moment. Also, they have developed Ouroboros. This is a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus algorithm. Proof of stake means that the crypto coins do not have to be mined, like at Bitcoin, but that holding ADA, the token of Cardano, in your wallet (stakes) ensures that you generate more Cardano. Many other crypto-coins, such as NEO, DASH, and Stratis, also use PoS, but this does involve security problems. Ouroboros has solved all these safety problems completely, and they can even prove this mathematically. If you want to know the exact details here, you can read their whitepaper here.
The Team behind Cardano
The team behind Cardano is very impressive. As you have already read, Charles Hoskinson, the former CEO and early founder of Ethereum, is the CEO. He has included Jeremy Wood (former operation manager at Ethereum). Together they started the engineering firm IOHK to build blockchains for academic institutions, governments, and companies. Now IOHK focuses on the further development of Cardano.
Also, the team consists of the Cardano Foundation and the company Emurgo. Cardano Foundation is a Swiss non-profit organization. Within the crypto startup, they are responsible for cooperating with governments and entering into strategic companies with large companies. Emerge specializes in implementing blockchains at companies and will therefore mainly focus on implementing the Cardano blockchain for companies that are interested in this.
Also, the team works closely with the University of Edinburgh, the University of Athens and the University of Connecticut.
Cardano's greatest benefits
Safety
As indicated above, the team's focus is on the security of the network. This safety has been tested and proven by many different researchers, professors, and other academics.
Scalability
Cardano, like for example Stratis, uses "side chains." These are blockchains that can exist alongside Cardano's main chain (and where other functions can be programmed), but also enjoy the safety of the main chain. Also, the team has indicated that in the coming months they will mainly focus on making scalability as large as possible. At this moment the network can perform 15 transactions per second, and with the current developments, it will soon be possible to do 256 per second.
Adaptability
Cardano is designed in such a way that it is very easy to adjust the crypto-coin, which is a big advantage in this rapidly changing world. At Bitcoin, you can see that it can cause quite a few problems if it takes two years (!) To solve a big problem. No hard forks (splits) need to be made at Cardano to improve the crypto-coin, but soft forks can be used.
Why did not we know this currency yet?
Cardano seems to be a promising crypto coin but seems to have escaped everyone's attention. It appears that the founders of this cryptocurrency have mainly focused on the Asian market and in particular Japan. One reason for this is that the Western market seemed to be saturated with ICOs and could be picked up more in Asia. This was a good move because in Japan the cryptocurrency was extremely popular and when the Western market discovered it, it made a very strong increase. The Western market is, therefore, starting to wake up and get interested in this relatively unknown currency.
Conclusion
Cardano (ADA) seems to be a good currency with a bright future. Especially the fact that the former CEO of Ethereum is behind it gives the crypto mount a strong reputation. It has to do with a lot of competitors trying to solve the same problems in a more innovative way, such as EOS and IOTA. However, the most significant force behind the cryptocurrency is that they have already proven their technology and it is not only based on promises. This makes this crypto coin a safer investment than the two previously mentioned. In the case of Cardano, you invest not in promises, but in proven technology.