Decentralised application and sidechain platform Lisk has completed initial coin offering (ICO). It makes the company the second highest funded crowdfunding project, after Ethereum, among blockchain startups.

The amount of nearly $5.9 mln was collected with 85,000,000 Lisk tokens distributed during the ICO, which started 22 February and lasted till 21 March. The ICO was supported by the digital currency exchange platform ShapeShift. Lisk tokens were sold in exchange for bitcoins, ether and crypti, as well as any other cryptocurrency accepted by ShapeShift.

At the moment, the platform is working in testnet mode. Lisk tokens, acquired during the ICO, are stored in Coinbase multisig repository. The official launch of the platform is scheduled for 11 April. As its official blog states, shortly after the launch Lisk is expected to appear on some exchange platforms, but no further details are provided.

Being the second best crowdfunded blockchain startup in the world, the Lisk team regards Ethereum as its main rival. Both companies specialise in developing decentralised applications (dapps). Lisk claims to be easier in operating, allowing its users to create their own dapps without the necessity to read extensive documentation or to learn a new programming language.

Project's API is written in JavaScript, which is considered to be the easiest and one of the most popular programming languages in the world.

The Lisk team sees another advantage of the platform in that each decentralised application there has its own chain of blocks – sidechain, which is separated from the main Lisk blockchain. This model permits to easily carry out scaling and reduces the overall blockchain size.

Lisk was founded by Max Kordek and Oliver Beddows, former developers of the decentralised application platform Crypti.

Earlier in March the company announced a strategic partnership with Chain of Things research lab to “investigate merging points for blockchain technology and the Internet of Things.”

Elena Platonova