Every year in blockchain brings a quantum leap of activity and adoption—it's sometimes hard to see all the growth amidst the chaos. The Ethereum ecosystem has been experiencing network effects as development on the Ethereum 2.0 and Web3 stack infrastructure stands up. Meanwhile, leading enterprises around the world are moving stridently on towards implementing blockchain solutions. On the retail level, decentralized finance has established itself at the forefront of digital assets. Directly in the middle of the action, Consensys has led the blockchain industry with infrastructure, product development, and community building.
2019 witnessed the integration of separate Ethereum stack components, and increased composability. OpenLaw integrated MakerDAO’s DAI stablecoin to settle real-world transactions, Alethio and TruSet teamed up to provide trusted, and accurate business-relevant data to API users, and a record number of DeFi projects built their protocols atop of Ethereum. 2019 was a year of continued Ethereum support, as Consensys Grants injected $420,000 into 20 initiatives to build Ethereum solutions. Gitcoin released Gitcoin Quests, providing a fun way to introduce Web2 devs to Web3.
This year, various enterprises found fitting use cases for blockchain technology; the luxury industry turned to blockchain to address the growing customer desire for sustainability. In May, LVMH partnered with Consensys to develop a platform that authenticates luxury goods. ING executed its first commodity trade transaction on komgo. The Global Legal Entity Identifier Foundation (GLEIF) leveraged uPort to issue digital credentials to enterprises and executives.
2019 was a year of enterprise exploration, increased composability, and ethically growing open source. This post takes you on a year-long journey of Consensys’ 2019.
January
Halo Holdings, AMD, and Consensys develop cloud-computing infrastructure W3BCLOUD.
Consensys contributes to $2M seed round of Monerium, the first and only company authorized to issue regulated e-money on blockchains.
Google, Lenfest, and Consensys partner with the creators of WordPress to fund the development of a next-generation publishing platform for digital news startups.
Consensys Labs invests $1 million in Coinhouse , the popular France-based crypto-asset investment platform.
The Consensys France dev team launch the Dauriel Network, enabling the issuance, management, and transfer of “tokenized” financial assets.
Consensys invests in Tenta , an encrypted, privacy-enabled, Ethereum-enabled crypto browser, powered by a secure network and trust protocol.
Harvard, the US State Department, the Levi Strauss Foundation, and Consensys team up to improve the lives of factory workers by asking personal questions about health, family, and workplace management.
Truffle, the smart contract development suite, has 113,253 monthly downloads.
Gitcoin reaches $263,946 gross marketplace value.
February
PegaSys releases Pantheon 1.0, an Ethereum client in Java.
uPort teams up with ABCPlatform to unlock universal access to the market of hard-to-trade commodities. Together, they reimagine investment diamonds as an institutional asset class for portfolio diversification, inflation hedging, risk management, and more.
Helena Network, a prediction markets platform for the crypto industry, goes live on mainnet.
Consensys adds FinTech leader Charles d’Haussy to the roster as Director for Strategic Initiatives and market lead for Hong Kong.
Consensys and Allinfra announce a joint venture, delivering access, choice, and liquidity to investors in unlisted infrastructure assets.
Singapore government-supported Tribe Accelerator signs MOU with Consensys with aims to undertake initiatives and activities to further the blockchain ecosystem in Singapore.
March
Consensys Ventures invests $1.15 million in Ligero, the first lightweight, scalable protocol for secure multi-party computation (MPC) and zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP).
Consensys invests in PDAX, the Philippine Digital Asset Exchange, a centralized trading platform that offers Filipinos an order book on which to trade digital assets in an open market for the first time.
Alethio opens its data pipeline through subscription API access.
Joe Lubin declares that Ethereum will be able to handle millions of transactions per second within two years.
Trustology launched TrustVault Personal Accounts in the UK, providing a safer and faster way to send, receive, and store crypto assets.
The World Economic Forum recognizes Consensys Chief Growth Officer Agnes Budzyn as one of the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders.
Consensys announces a strategic partnership with leading security token advisory firm Satis Group.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YILcuTidRVU&t=
April
Consensys Ventures announces its Tachyon II Accelerator Program.
Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company (EITC)’s telecommunications company du partners with Consensys to build decentralized applications and to offer an integrated set of solutions in support of the UAE Blockchain Strategy.
The Blockchain Game Alliance (BGA) opens doors for new membership applications.
Forbes reveals that over half of the top 50 billion-dollar companies exploring blockchain are working with Ethereum.
The Enterprise Ethereum Alliance announces a blockchain neutral Token Taxonomy Initiative .
MetaMask records 1.1 million transactions.
Gitcoin hits $1,231,845 of total platform value. Founder Kevin Owocki explains the platform’s strategy.
Bonus: Vitalik raps about Ethereum 2.0 at EDCON. No, really. It happened.
May
Consensys invests in 21 Ethereum projects from April’s Tachyon II cohort. The investments marked the fourth straight month of increased investment activity.
PegaSys releases the Pantheon Academy Training, a free course that allows developers to familiarize themselves with the Java-based Ethereum client.
Consensys and L atham & Watkins LLP launch the Automated Convertible Note, an OpenLaw -based document generator to help startups raise capital with customizable market standard terms and optional digital token provisions.
OpenLaw and RocketLawyer team up to make blockchain-based contracts accessible to the millions of Rocket Lawyer customers.
Joe Lubin delivers the Ethereal NY keynote from the future—the year 2047.
Investor Mike Novogratz declares that he’s more bullish than ever on bitcoin.
Law firm August Debouzy joins Consensys France in a partnership to offer STO consulting to asset managers, investors, distributors, and enterprises.
Joyce Lai debuts the New Territories Podcast, featuring conversations with industry thought leaders and exploring the intersection of policy, law, blockchain technology, and more.
GridPlus announces the arrival of its Lattice1 hardware wallet.
Ethereal NYC attendees participate in 10 Helena prediction markets using Austin Griffith’s Burner Wallet.
Joe Lubin and Vitalik Buterin donate a combined 4000 ether to MolochDAO, pushing the total funds up to $1M.
Amberdata and MythX announce an official integration partnership.
Kaleido releases an Enterprise tech stack, featuring over a dozen new enterprise tools, features, and capabilities.
European fintech venture LiquidShare partners with Consensys’ PegaSys to create a post-trade settlement infrastructure for shares in small and medium-sized enterprises.
In partnership with LVMH and Microsoft , Consensys announces AURA, a consortium blockchain developed by luxury brands for luxury brands.
Blockchain for Social Impact Coalition adds three new board members.
Consensys releases “The Blockchain Jobs Report 2019” and the Blockchain Developer Job Kit, a mega resource for Web2 developers looking to join Web3.
Gnosis launches the dxDAO—a next-generation decentralized autonomous organization for community governance of software protocols.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xq-UatSOqFg&t=
June
Consensys Social Impact launches a mentorship initiative in Iraq.
Imbrex and TruSet announce a strategic partnership to collect and curate real estate contracts for each American state using blockchain technology.
Verified Organic and Treum began the first phase of tracking organic hemp production for integrated CBD from seed to sale using Ethereum.
3box raises a $2.5 million seed round led by Brad Burnham through Placeholder Ventures.
Consensys joined The Global Leaders’ Forum’s Communications Blockchain Network (CBN).
Truffle has 103,483 monthly downloads.
July
Supported by Consensys, CapBridge launches 1exchange, the world’s first regulated private securities exchange.
Infura introduces Infura+, a premium subscription service for Infura’s Ethereum API.
Consensys announced the first international location for Ethereal Summit: Tel Aviv.
Mata Capital partnered with Consensys and Screeb to deploy a blockchain platform for the real estate fund industry.
Consensys Social Impact publishes Project Unblocked Cash, a blockchain case study for NGOs.
August
TuffleCon takes place at the Microsoft Campus in Redmond, WA.
Truffle announces that its developer suite will include support for Corda, Hyperledger Fabric, and Tezos.
DeFi and DAO take center stage at Berlin Blockchain Week
Joe Lubin says, “Ethereum won’t fail. It is massively decentralized, it’s useful, it’s growing incredibly quickly, and it is antifragile. Whatever you throw at it will make it stronger.”
Panvala launches on mainnet at DappCon.
Hyperledger Besu becomes the first public blockchain on Hyperledger.
Consensys launches Daisy—a platform to manage crypto payments.
OpenLaw teams up with MakerDAO to make DAI a global currency.
September
Consensys joins Hyperledger as a premier member.
Kaleido becomes the first blockchain service provider to integrate QED-IT’s zero-knowledge proof privacy protocol.
TrueProfile.io announces uPort integration.
Kaleido-based commodity trade finance platform komgo channels over USD 700m of financing by network members.
Consensys announces the launch of PegaSys Plus, the commercial distribution of its core Ethereum infrastructure.
Consensys participates in Sibos, one of the largest banking and finance conferences in the world.
Consensys introduces Codefi, the blockchain operating system for commerce and finance.
Ethereal Tel Aviv commences. Vitalik Buterin joins Joe Lubin on stage to discuss the future of Ethereum.
Consensys and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) launch Impactio.
PwC and Onfido join uPort’s portability identity efforts in the UK financial services sector.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBtAgUJNgkQ
October
SKALE Network raised $17.1 million to launch its mainnet from Consensys Labs and eighteen additional investors.
4,000+ developers, designers, researchers, and scholarship recipients come together in Osaka, Japan, for Devcon5.
During Devcon5, Infura, MythX, and Alethio announce new Software-as-a-Service models to offer service-level agreements to customers.
Joe Lubin reveals his thoughts on moving to a decentralized World Wide Web.
Gitcoin released Gitcoin Quests—a colorful, gamified way to learn about the Web3 ecosystem.
Joe Lubin puts out a call for One Million Ethereum Developers.
Consensys Grants awards $175,000 to seven projects.
Joe Lubin announces the formation of Consensys Space.
Consensys Space co-founders unveil TruSat, an open-source, citizen-powered space sustainability system.
Evigence Sensors announce a partnership with Treum to offer a blockchain-based temperature traceability solution.
Consensys Diligence and R&D team up to publish, “The State of Privacy on Ethereum.”
3box introduces a simple, clean, decentralized comments plugin for dapps.
uPort launches two product suites, uPort Serto and uPort Open.
November
uPort partners with the Global Legal Entity Identifier Foundation (GLEIF) to launch decentralized corporate identity management.
Dr. Andreas Freund and Lewis Cohen of DLx Law publish a white paper entitled “Blockchain in Public Goods Allocation.”
Helena prediction market platform integrates with Rhombus oracles.
Consensys alumni Sam Cassatt announces the launch of Aligned Capital, an investment firm created to anticipate and invest in the core technologies of civilization-scale, evolutionary changes in human behavior.
Consensys Labs invests in atpar, which delivers banking-grade financial applications through the development of the ACTUS Protocol.
Consensys attends Convergence, the first-organized global blockchain congress.
Consensys releases The Singapore Ecosystem Report at the 2019 Singapore FinTech Festival.
Consensys publishes a comprehensive list of public sector blockchain experiments planned, in progress, or paused globally.
December
Ethereum completes the Istanbul Hard Fork.
Consensys Grants announce six new Wave 2 winners.
Helena kicks off free monthly prediction markets tournaments and reaches 160 prediction markets and 8,000 predictions to-date. Sign up for Helena here.
Peeps announce the Peeps DAO to decentralize politics and social action.
Blockchain researcher and cryptographer Amira Bouguera publishes, “How Will Quantum Computing Affect Blockchain?”
Alethio and TruSet join forces to provide trusted and accurate business-relevant data to API users.
Truffle suite reaches 2,703,701 lifetime downloads.
Gitcoin finishes the year with $2,844,664 gross marketplace value.