Plasm: Scalable, Interoperable DApps on Polkadot

About this Episode

This week Jorrin Bruns (Support Engineer, Parity Technologies) speaks with Sota Watanabe, CEO of Stake Technologies and founder of Plasm, a platform designed to help developers deploy fast and secure decentralized applications (DApps) on Polkadot.

They discuss advancing Web3 via cross-chain collaboration, supporting DApp development, and decentralizing the Plasm network. Watanabe walks us through being the first parachain on Rococo, completing the first cross-chain message (together with Acala), bringing Ethereum compatibility and ZK-Rollups to Polkadot, staking and trading DApps, securing a parachain slot, and much more.

Highlights:
0:00 Intro to Stake Technologies and Plasm
03:35 Japan’s version of Web3, the Trusted Web Council
06:35 The value of decentralized organizations
09.48 Connecting blockchains with Substrate
10:32 Support for multiple blockchain technologies
13:05 Plasm’s unique mechanisms; DApp staking and ZKRollups
16:50 Buy and sell Plasm applications
18:15 Stake Technologies Web3 grants
22:10 Schiden and Plasm parachain strategy
24:07 Making blockchain history
26:36 Cross-chain message passing
30:05 NFT capabilities beyond gaming
33:09 Encouraging DApps to build on the Plasm Network

Links:
Sota Watanabe on Twitter
Plasm Network website
Stake Technologies website

Key Quotes:
“When it comes to a smart contract platform, I think a layer 2 solution is needed in the long run so we are making the foundation, the Substrate of Web3, for really normal people. Polkadot itself is a scaling solution, but this is a layer 1 scalability solution. We need vertical scalability which is layer 1, that is why we are working on ZKRollups now. Vertical scalability is much faster, more flexible, and cheaper since layer 2 doesn’t need to be a broken chain”

“What makes Plasm different from other parachains? We innovated two things, one is DApps staking and another one is the scaling solution ZKRollups”

“We are working on an Ethereum bridge, a Secret Network bridge, and also a Binance bridge in the near future”

“We have already connected our Plasm network testnet to Rococo and we have deployed a Web Assembly smart contract and it works on the top of Polkadot’s parachain testnet”

“In the past few months, we have successfully completed the first cross-chain messaging passing with Acala. Our token can be transferred to Acala and you can receive the Acala token on the Plasm network”

“We support Ethereum Virtual Machine on the top of the Polkadot parachain, so the user can actually develop and make applications on top of Polkadot parachain, instead of individual substrate chains. I think this is one of the most important upgrades in the ecosystem”

“On the top of the Plasm network, we can transfer ownership of a smart contract”

“We are making a new M&A solution in the blockchain system”