Long-Awaited Parachains Are Finally Coming To Polkadot

Polkadot&39s (DOT) long-awaited parachains are expected to launch on the network later on in the year, according to its developers earlier this week. From the projected initial date of November 11th, the community may start celebrating soon with thanks to the existence of &lsquoauctions&rsquo.

After approximately 5 years of rigorous study, research, testing and development, the layer-0 blockchain will be able to finally reach a much-anticipated milestone before long. As a result of this announcement, DOT&rsquos price has also been steadily increasing as of late, as it currently sits at just about $44 which is an increase of over 30% in the past 7 days. DOT is now also the 8th highest-ranked cryptocurrency by market capitalization.

Parachains

For those who might be unaware, parachains are unique, project-oriented blockchains which, for the purposes of this article, are incorporated into the Polkadot as well as Kusama (KSM) networks. We may hence understand parachains to be distinct blockchains that run on top of the primary Polkadot blockchain. They may be tailored to a variety of use cases and allocated into the aforementioned blockchain, which is also known as the Relay Chain. The Relay Chain is essentially the core of the Kusama and Polkadot networks.

Furthermore, Gavin Wood himself had recently stated that all of the technical barriers pertaining to the launch of parachains on Polkadot have effectively been overcome. Additionally, he stated that both auctions and parachains are now indeed ready for the first production release which will occur on Polkadot. Finally, he concluded his statement by saying that ever since the first week of this past June, the parachains have in fact been running smoothly on Kusama.

What&rsquos next?

Over 49,000 separate addresses have contributed more than 2 million KSM, Kusama&39s native token, to crowd loans through the existing Kusama parachain auctions by now. To that end, DOT shall be utilized in the forthcoming auctions. So far, a slew of decentralized initiatives, including decentralized identity protocol Kilt and DeFi-based entities like Phala&39s Khala Network and Moonbeam&39s Moonriver Network have earned parachain slots, with more expected to follow suit.

If authorized via the on-chain governance of Polkadot, then the starting auctions for the first batch shall commence from November 11th till December 9th. Auctions for the second batch shall begin in early 2022, and these are anticipated to last from 2023 till 2024 when &39winners&39 are proclaimed and additional networks join Polkadot.