After the Zilliqa token sale back in December 2017, one of the main concerns about Zilliqa was that the team was just a group of Ph.D.’s that was entirely tech-oriented, but that didn’t have the skills to market and grow the platform. Now that Zilliqa just announced the second wave of Zilliqa Grant Awardees, and made many growth and marketing hires, it is fair to assume that this concern has been completely debunked.

The first round of #BuildOnZil grant awards was focused on the development of core infrastructure that Zilliqa needs as an ecosystem and a few interesting ideas that show the true power of a scalable blockchain that does not compromise on decentralization.

Some of the most interesting projects in this first round included:

OpenZesame: an intuitive iOS app for sending and receiving ZILs, and for interacting with smart contracts.

an intuitive iOS app for sending and receiving ZILs, and for interacting with smart contracts. ZIL Browser Extension: although this project currently lacks a very creative name, it is a browser extension that aims to offer similar functionality to the wildly popular browser extension MetaMask.

although this project currently lacks a very creative name, it is a browser extension that aims to offer similar functionality to the wildly popular browser extension MetaMask. Scilla Vanilla: a repository with reusable smart contracts that Zilliqa DApp developers can make use of to reduce the development time for their applications.

a repository with reusable smart contracts that Zilliqa DApp developers can make use of to reduce the development time for their applications. EMONT Frenzy: a blockchain game by the popular game development company EMONT Alliance where players enter as fish to collect tokens and battle with others. The aim of this game is to showcase how Zilliqa might be a superior blockchain for on-chain games than Ethereum.

a blockchain game by the popular game development company EMONT Alliance where players enter as fish to collect tokens and battle with others. The aim of this game is to showcase how Zilliqa might be a superior blockchain for on-chain games than Ethereum. BTCT Futures: a cross-chain protocol for BTC Token issuance on both Ethereum and Zilliqa.

The core focus of the second #BuildOnZil Grant Awards wave was User and Developer experience. It’s still very early in the blockchain space, and it is often hard for newcomers to interact with them. Hence, Zilliqa is putting a lot of thought and effort into not only being a scalable blockchain pioneer, but also a pioneer in usability and user experience.

Some of the most interesting projects in this second wave include:

Moonlet: a highly intuitive open source wallet that allows users to send and receive ZILs, and to interact with Zilliqa contracts.

a highly intuitive open source wallet that allows users to send and receive ZILs, and to interact with Zilliqa contracts. Zilliqa Ledger Wallet: Ledger is one of the most popular and secure hardware wallets available. Having a Zilliqa integration on Ledger will enable holders of ZIL to store their coins more safely.

Ledger is one of the most popular and secure hardware wallets available. Having a Zilliqa integration on Ledger will enable holders of ZIL to store their coins more safely. ZilBlocks: a Zilliqa Blockchain Explorer that enables users to view transactions, smart contracts, and more.

a Zilliqa Blockchain Explorer that enables users to view transactions, smart contracts, and more. Learn-Scilla: a gamified learning portal that shows developers how to start creating their first smart contracts in Scilla.

a gamified learning portal that shows developers how to start creating their first smart contracts in Scilla. Zilliqa Naming Service: similarly to the Ethereum Name Service (ENS), the Zilliqa Name Service enables anyone to create a .ZIL address that can be used to receive payments in a more intuitive way than with a confusing wallet address.

Finally, in the latest Grant announcement the team also announced that it will soon be holding a third wave of Grant awards. This third wave will be focused on working on the following aspects:

Layer 2 Solutions (for gaming)

Gaming SDKs Unity SDK Laya SDK

Dapps

Atomic Swap

Education

REPL for Scilla

Scilla

WASM Compiler Wrapper for ECDSA signatures in C++ Wrapper for Pairing in C++ Transpiler from Solidity to Scilla

If you are a talented developer that want to support the growing Zilliqa ecosystem, then you can now apply for a #BuildOnZIL Grants Wave 3 here.

The Zilliqa ecosystem is growing and its growing fast, surprisingly, only a select few people in the cryptocurrency space seem to be aware of it at the moment.

The last point of concern that Zilliqa skeptics are echoing is speculation around another potential mainnet delay. However, Xinshu Dong (Zilliqa CEO), has already confirmed on multiple instances that this will not be the case, and that the mainnet will launch on time by the end of January 2019.

As soon as the Zilliqa mainnet goes live, the last skeptics are silenced, and this growing ecosystem comes to fruition, Zilliqa may very well redefine the entire blockchain space.