Telegram launched private testing of its Telegram Open Network. The new blockchain is available to several development teams at the moment.

As reported by Russian media outlet Vedomosti, Telegram launched private testing for its TON network. Several professional development teams from around the globe, including Russia, participate in the testing stage.

As sources report, despite there’re no final results yet, TON has already proved its ability to handle transactions much faster if compared to other networks that are considered to be its main competitors.

Based on cryptographically protected distributed registries, the Telegram Open Network is said to become a serious rival to Ethereum for the launch and execution of smart contracts and decentralized applications.

Worth noting, that TON’s launch date has been delayed several times. As we reported in November 2018, the blockchain platform was already 70% ready, while the test-version of TON was said to see the public in the upcoming months.

Then, in January, Russian media outlet The Bell reported that TON was ready as much as 90%. Project’s developers targeted early 2019 as a launch date, however, they also noted that a slight delay of two-three months was possible, as the innovative nature of the project may hide some challenges for the team.

Though the exact date when TON is to be launched is still a full-blown mystery, it has been revealed that if it is not launched by October 31, 2019, purchase agreements for the tokens will be terminated.

Let us also remind that Telegram held two private ICO rounds for its token and network and managed to raise around $1.7 billion for their development.

Next Big Thing in Crypto?

Telegram boasts over 200 million monthly users globally. Its messaging service serves as a great alternative to those willing to use anything except Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp (concerns over user privacy may be the reason for that).

As digital currencies gain unprecedented traction, logically enough, Telegram is looking to expand its user base by offering an innovative blockchain platform and its native currency – the Telegram Open Network and GRAM token.

Crypto analyst Alex Sofpel from crypto trading platform Monfex predicts that the GRAM token could generate a whopping $4 billion in revenue for Telegram by 2022.

As we previously reported, experts went even further – they predicted that the total capitalization of Gram could be worth $29.5 billion by the end of 2019 already.

Going back to Sofpel’s analysis, he explains his bold prediction basing on two key assumptions. First is that Telegram will achieve 1 billion monthly active users by 2022. It assumes 200 million users in 2018 and an annual growth rate of 50 percent.

Secondly, according to Alex Sofpel, each user will generate $5 in revenue annually. Saying this, he compares Telegram to WeChat and Google Pay, which accordingly generate $5.60 and $6 from users.

Facebook Stepping Telegram’s Toes?

As you may have already noticed Telegram is actively expanding its services and widening its client base. Today it can be already considered to be a real competitor to such a social media behemoth as Facebook though it can’t be classified as its direct rival to the specificity of the platforms’ functionality.

Telegram is much closer to Facebook’s messaging app WhatsApp. Nevertheless, due to the increased outages that Facebook’s and WhatsApp’s users have suffered recently, Telegram has an opportunity to enjoy millions of newcomers who, according to its founder Pavel Durov, could get true privacy there.

Nevertheless, the sizes of the user bases is not the only criterion to compare these platforms.

As CoinSpeaker has already reported earlier, not only Telegram is going to launch its own blockchain and crypto. Facebook has its blockchain initiatives as well.

It has been disclosed that Facebook is developing its own cryptocurrency that is said to be a stablecoin backed by a basket of different cryptos. Though it still hasn’t been officially confirmed, Facebook already has its blockchain division and the company is seriously considering the use of this tech throughout its entire ecosystem.