Pontem Will Use Polkadot to Connect Diem – DeFi To 2.7B Users
Pontem moves ahead plans to be Diem’s Polkadot-based testnet with establishing a new partnership with node infrastructure provider PinkNode.
Pontem’s Deal With PinkNode
Pontem has partnered with PinkNode, an infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) provider on Polkadot.
The partnership allows Pontem deploy an experimental test network for Facebook’s Diem blockchain, formerly known to many as Libra.
Diem is a blockchain project from Big Tech leader Facebook but is not open to public participants due to its permissioned nature. It makes it difficult for developers and entrepreneurs working on Diem and build open source solutions that compatible to the level of innovation with public blockchains such as Ethereum or Polkadot.
Enter Pontem. Founded in 2020, Pontem uses Substrate, Polkadot’s software development kit, to build a blockchain with a codebase very similar to Diem’s.
The project aims to help Diem onboarding new features and solutions by first testing them in the Polkadot ecosystem. To this end, the project recently raised $4.5 million from several venture funds including Mechanism Capital, Kenetic Capital, and Animoca Brands.
The PinkNode deal will allow Pontem to deploy nodes and other API endpoints on Kusama, Polkadot’s canary network, to finalize its network.
Due to deploying the nodes and API endpoints, Pontem will help developers interested in Diem test new features in the Polkadot ecosystem before directly submitting them to Diem. This will also enable new projects on Diem to test their product-market fit on Polkadot.
The founder of Pontem, Boris Povod, commented the partnership:
“With Pinknode acting as our primary infrastructure provider, their reliable and secure API endpoints will be a key building block to completing our joint goal of improving Polkadot’s current infrastructure, while also allowing us to work towards our goal of becoming the experimentation network for Diem. We look forward to what this partnership will bring.”
Through Polkadot’s interoperable network, Pontem also plans to build a bridge that connects the Diem blockchain with Ethereum, the network that underpins the burgeoning decentralized finance space and contains more than $55 billion in total value locked.
According to Pontem, connecting the two networks will expose Facebook’s 2.7 billion users to DeFi. Slated for launch in 2021, Diem will issue fiat-backed stablecoins that can be integrated with Facebook’s banking and e-commerce services, a strategic move that faced a lot of resistance from regulators.
