Bullish on Solana: Top 5 Takeaways From Solana Breakpoint

September 2024 was a big month for the crypto industry. Two major crypto conferences – Token2049 and Solana Breakpoint – drew thousands of crypto enthusiasts to Singapore to share ideas about the industry’s future.

Solana Breakpoint, in particular, was hailed as a success due to its developer-centric events and exciting product announcements. Crypto projects and multinational companies like PayPal and Franklin Templeton took the stage to discuss plans to build on one of the world’s most popular layer one (L1) blockchains – Solana (SOL).

If you are a Solana bull, you will be happy to learn about the exciting developments announced at Solana Breakpoint 2024. Techopedia rounds up the top five takeaways from the Solana Breakpoint conference for you.

Key Takeaways

Solana validator client called Frankendancer went live on the Mainnet.

PayPal says Solana is better suited for retail crypto payment than Ethereum.
Franklin Templeton to launch a mutual fund on Solana.
Jupiter makes headlines with product updates and acquisition announcements.
Solana’s web3-enabled mobile device and handheld gaming console turn heads.

Table of Contents Table of Contents

Key Takeaways
Top Highlights of Solana Breakpoint 2024
The Bottom Line
FAQs
References

Table of Contents

Key Takeaways
Top Highlights of Solana Breakpoint 2024
The Bottom Line

Show Full Guide

FAQs
References

Top Highlights of Solana Breakpoint 2024

1. Frankendancer Goes Live on Solana Mainnet

Frankendancer is an early version of an independent Solana validator client called Firedancer built by crypto infrastructure company Jump Trading.

For context, a validator client is software run by validator nodes in a blockchain network. At the time of writing, Solana had only two validator clients.

The development is touted as one of the most important innovations in the Solana ecosystem. Firedancer is expected to improve Solana’s validator client diversity and make the network more resilient against attacks and bugs. Additionally, it is also expected to help Solana achieve higher throughput and enable sharding.

2. PayPal Prefers Solana Over Ethereum

Solana bulls will be happy to hear what Jose Fernandez da Ponte, head of crypto at payments company PayPal, had to say about the Ethereum versus Solana debate.

At Solana Breakpoint 2024, Da Ponte said that Ethereum was “not the best solution for payments” as a retail payment network would need to facilitate “at least 1,000 transactions per second.”

Da Ponte, who is in charge of developing PayPal’s PYUSD stablecoin, added Solana’s enhanced token creation framework called Token Extensions was a “big reason” why PayPal chose to deploy its stablecoin on Solana.

He explained that retail crypto payments were not only about speed and throughput but also about catering to different needs, such as privacy.

Jose Fernandez da Ponte — head of crypto @PayPal:

“Crypto is too big for us to ignore”
“Ethereum isn’t fit for payments”
“Token extensions was a big reason why we chose Solana”

Bullish pic.twitter.com/KB4STX0I7e

— Milk Road (@MilkRoadDaily) September 20, 2024

3. Franklin Templeton, Societe Generale & Citi to Tokenize Assets on Solana

An impressive list of traditional finance giants stated their intentions of building on Solana at the Solana Breakpoint 2024 conference.

Franklin Templeton

Franklin Templeton, an early adopter of real-world asset tokenization technology, announced plans to launch a money market fund on Solana. According to the Solana Foundation, Franklin Templeton will become the first asset manager to issue securities on Solana.

Securitize

Securitize, the tokenization partner of BlackRock’s on-chain fund BUIDL, announced it will add native support for Solana. Securitize said that it will partner with Wormhole to enable cross-chain transfers for all its tokenized assets.

Societe Generale

France-based asset manager Societe Generale announced that it will launch its Euro-pegged MiCA-compliant stablecoin EURCV on Solana. Guillaume Chatain, head of business development at Societe Generale’s crypto unit SG Forge, said the company will tokenize more assets, including money market fund alternatives, structured products, and bonds on Solana.

He added that low latency, high throughput, and low cost were the main reasons for choosing Solana.

Citigroup

Multinational bank Citigroup said that the company was “deeply researching” Solana’s infrastructure and ecosystem for its tokenization platform named Citi Integrated Digital Assets Platform (CIDAP).

“We want to join the industry as well. We want to explore opportunities with Solana and see where the future takes us,” said Mark Attard, head of digital assets at Citigroup.

Societe Generale’s digital assets subsidiary, SG FORGE, is adding support for Solana, starting with the launch of its EUR CoinVertible (EURCV) stablecoin.

EURCV is the first MiCA compliant stablecoin issued by a bank. In the future, SG FORGE may also bring its other tokenized… pic.twitter.com/8dey205Wwe

— Solana (@solana) September 20, 2024

4. Jupiter Acquires Solana FM & Coinhall

Among all the Solana-based projects at Breakpoint 2024, Jupiter – the most popular decentralized exchange (DEX) on Solana – stole the show with product updates and acquisition announcements.

Jupiter announced the acquisition of a Solana blockchain explorer called Solana FM which is expected to “10x” the project’s data and infrastructure capabilities.

Jupiter also acquired a Cosmos-based DEX aggregator called Coinhall. The acquisition of Coinhall will see Jupiter upgrade its memecoin trading platform called Ape to Ape.Pro, which will introduce new features such as meme coin minting, seed-phrase-free setup,one-click trades, and a mobile application.

The project announced that a Jupiter mobile app will be launched soon, while its perpetual futures contract trading platform will introduce limit orders and gasless fees.

In case you missed it: @sssionggg delivered this year’s @SolanaConf keynote which revealed 5 key product updates, 3 fun experiments and the expansion of the Jupiter team, setting the direction for the future of the Jupiter United Planet (J.U.P).

Watch the keynote with the… pic.twitter.com/PfSFGOQ06n

— Jupiter 🪐 (@JupiterExchange) September 22, 2024

5. Solana Devices Put on a Show

Unveiled a day before the Solana Breakpoint 2024 conference, Solana’s web3 mobile device called Seeker is the latest model that seeks to prove skeptics wrong about the viability of crypto-enabled mobile devices.

According to Solana Mobile General Manager Emmett Hollyer, the Seeker has already surpassed 140,000 units in presales. The device, currently available for a pre-order price of $500, comes with an inbuilt hardware wallet and exclusive rewards.

Memecoin airdrops have been a key demand driver for Solana mobile devices. In 2023, the Saga phone – the Seeker’s predecessor – sold out in the US and Europe as crypto investors chased the BONK token airdrop rewarded to Saga phone owners.

Elsewhere, Play Solana introduced a handheld crypto gaming device called Play Solana Gen 1 at Solana Breakpoint 2024. According to the company, the device will allow users to earn rewards, feature a hardware wallet, and enable a retro gaming experience.

We are proud to present the first handheld Web3 gaming device built on Solana 👾

Please welcome, Play Solana Gen1 – PSG1. pic.twitter.com/nMEAAgzIEH

— Play Solana (@playsolana) September 19, 2024

The Bottom Line

It’s difficult not to be a Solana bull at the moment. The Solana Breakpoint 2024 conference reminded the crypto community that Solana is a serious contender to surpass Ethereum as the world’s premier smart contract blockchain platform.

We look forward to Ethereum’s Devcon 7 conference scheduled for mid-November 2024 to learn more on how Ethereum plans to keep its place at the top.