Celo is a type of blockchain ecosystem that seeks to increase the use of virtual currency among smartphone users. Celo intends to bring billions of smartphone owners from all over the world to trading in online currencies simply by using phone numbers as public keys. The Celo network, as part of decentralized finance (DeFi), also enables the creation of decentralized apps (dApps) and smart contracts.
Simply said, Celo is a platform that serves as a global infrastructure for facilitating bitcoin payments with an emphasis on smartphone users all over the world. The platform's goal is to make financial activities available to everyone on a global level, thanks to the platform's potential to send and receive payments from any cell number on the planet.
Celo was created by a group of people from various world-renowned institutions, including the World Bank, Google, Harvard University, Visa, MIT, the US Department of Justice, and the University of Cambridge. The network's main net was first introduced in April 2020. Along with the platform's main net launch, the Celo Foundation, a US-based non-profit organization that helps in the development and growth of the open-source platform, was also announced. Celo was founded by Rene Reinsberg and Marek Olszewski in2017, approximately five years ago. Both of them worked for GoDaddy, a company that specializes in web hosting.
By 2025, more than seven billion people will own a smartphone, but there are currently less than 0.1 billion cryptocurrency users. Usability and price stability, according to the Celo Foundation, are two of the primary hurdles to cryptocurrency adoption. Celo's mobile-first strategy was developed to bridge that gap.
The platform removes technological barriers to cryptocurrency adoption and use. The company makes financial tools available to everyone with a mobile phone by utilizing the current global mobile infrastructure.
The Celo network depends on three contributors:
· Light Clients - Celo Network applications that run on users' mobile devices, such as Celo's wallet.
· Validator Nodes - Computers that validate performance and generate new blocks as part of Celo's compliance approach.
· Full Nodes -Computers that serve as a link between Validator nodes and mobile wallets, accepting requests from light clients and forwarding transactions to Validator nodes.
The validator nodes in Celo's system must be voted in by CELO token holders.
Byzantines Fault Tolerance (BFT) - The Byzantine Fault Tolerance (BFT), a Proof of Stake governance mechanism, is at the heart of Celo that keeps the distributed network of computers in sync.
Validator nodes must initially stake a minimum of 10,000 CELO tokens in order to power the blockchain and vote on alterations, meaning that everyone who possesses CELO can assist run the network.
The use cases of Celo token are: · Owners of CELO can utilize their assets to pay network transaction fees, sometimes known as gas payments or gas fees. The Celo protocol sets a minimum gas price for all transactions and contract executions. · CELO holders can also vote on governance ideas, such as improvements to the Celo protocol or changes to the reserve target asset allocation, with their assets.
DATE | NEWS/EVENTS | IMPACT |
04/06/2022 | The Celo Foundation has launched a $20 million campaign called "Connect the World" | +40% Increase |
07/05/2022 | TerraUSD and LUNA both collapsed, and as a result, a number of crypto platforms folded in the aftermath | -35% Decrease |
29/08/2021 | Leading Ethereum DeFi Projects Joining Celo on DeFi for the People Collaboration include Aave, Curve, Pool Together, and Sushi | +67% Increase |
25/06/2021 | Opera's crypto wallet app now supports Celo stablecoins | +33% Increase |
20/04/2021 | Deutsche Telekom invests in mobile DeFi platform Celo | +48% Increase |
Today, we are at a turning point in crypto, where blockchain technology has already proven successful in a number of ways but lacks the user-friendly experience that will push it into broad adoption. Companies that simplify wonderful yet complex technology, such as web 1.0 and web 2.0, have demonstrated that worldwide adoption is possible. Most consumers won't care what smart contracts the DeFi services they use are built on for decades, just as the bulk of internet users have no understanding of how the internet's backbone technology works.
Celo is definitely one of the pioneering projects with the goal of speeding up DeFi adoption and bringing in more people to crypto. It'll be fascinating to see how its ecosystem develops and what initiatives it takes on next.
Celo