You may be new to the Cryptocurrencies concept! if so we recommend you to read the article : What is cryptocurrency

Introduction

For the first time in history you can move value instantly from one place to the other side of the world with no intermediary and the analysts estimate a $300bn to $400bn global industry by 2027.  So regardless of what people say about bitcoin, this technology is here to stay and a whole new class of blockchains are sprouting and evolving!

Using this technology, You could build a currency, a social network, a ride sharing app, a stock exchange or an identity management system however, there is currently no brand loyalty in it so it’s an arms race and whomever can do something better, wins.

The internet is rapidly looking very different and much of that is being determined by the battle that is currently unfolding. So who’s in the race?

The top contenders for the decentralized platforms are Ethereum, Stellar, EOS, NEO and NEM. Here’s what you need to know…

Ethereum:

Ethereum was Created by Vitalik Buterin and Gavin Wood. It is the first decentralized platform and it paved the way for the next generation. It mimicked many of Bitcoin’s design patterns therefore inherited many of Bitcoin’s flaws; it is slow and consumes a horrendous amount of electricity. also it does not have a good way to make enhancements to their protocol without hard forking (or splitting Ethereum into two separate blockchains, one with the enhancement and one without).

If Ethereum can work through these problems and upgrade quickly, it can maintain a decent ranking, however it’s likely it will have to compete more and more with newer technologies and it may get used only for minor niches like hosting ICOs or specific smart contracts.

Stellar: 

Stellar was developed by Jed McCaleb. It has high performance and secure transaction with exponentially cheaper cost on the network.

EOS: 

EOS was developed by a company called BlockOne run by CTO Dan Larimer. It is still undergoing development and doesn’t actually have anything concrete. It promise to achieve huge performance improvements over Ethereum’s by implementing a number of scaling techniques, such as Delegated Proof of Stake (DPoS), parallel execution, partial evaluation and other optimizations.

NEO: 

NEO was developed by Da Hongfei-Founder and Zhang Zhengwen-Core Developer (Backed by the company OnChain). It is committed to the use of blockchain technology and digital identity to digitize assets, the use of smart contracts for digital assets to be self-managed, to achieve ‘smart economy’ with a distributed network.

NEO is building by learning from Ethereum’s mistakes so NEO is developing their platform in anticipation of future demands. Meanwhile Ethereum is developing in response to new demands. NEO is embedded in the Chinese market, which could be massive especially if developed properly.

NEM:

NEM was developed by Lon Wong- Founding President of the NEM.io Foundation. It is not mined but harvested. it has its own consensus algorithm using POI (proof-of-importance), The more POI you have by holding stake and transacting, the more POI you gain. The more that XEM is used, the higher the amount harvesters receive. This is an incentive to invest in XEM because it will pay for its own fees.

All of the above want to become the part of the dominant blockchain platforms for the internet: for decentralized applications and smart contracts. The issue with all of these cryptocurrencies is that barriers to entry are low. New virtual currencies are cropping up each month left right and center, many with their own proprietary versions of blockchain. A better version of each of these could appear at any time taking the Microsoft crown So let’s wait and see what unfolds from these players.

Extracted from original Blog in: https://hackernoon.com

We hope this article helped you to have an idea about top players on blockchain arena

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Who’s in the race to first place in Blockchain