The second quarter of 2018 is coming to a close and we only have 22 days till the second half begins, and with it, the third quarter of 2018. The past few months since December, have been an exciting time for the crypto-verse with events such as the market peaking, then dipping like never seen before; to projects like Tron (TRX) overcoming FUD as well as Zilliqa (ZIL) introducing sharding. IOSToken (IOST) has also emerged during this time period, as the solution to the internet of services question and how to make it more secure and scalable for online services.

All three projects and cryptocurrencies have been identified as possible Ethereum ‘killers’, but now let us focus on these three and why they should be on our radar as we inch closer to Q3 of this year.

So what exactly is IOST?

The IOST project has been closely followed by its loyal fans since last December and has gathered a lot of following amongst the Crypto-community. The vision of the project is to build a secure and scalable blockchain for smart services. When complete, the IOST ecosystem will be capable of hosting different kinds of services as well as innovative new business models that weren’t previously feasible.

It will achieve this through providing the aforementioned scalable, secure and decentralized blockchain platform that will be the preferred choice of Decentralized Application developers who will use it to create, innovate and build their next big ideas.

The project is impressively building a strong and vibrant IOST community that will be essential in building a successful blockchain infrastructure moving forward. The project has gained significant growth internationally in not only China, but also San Francisco and Singapore. The latter office recently welcomed new experienced members to the team.

What about Tron (TRX) and Zilliqa (ZIL)?

Tron and Zilliqa are both very ambitious projects in the crypto-verse. Tron aims at decentralizing the web on the blockchain and to become the choice platform for Decentralized Applications in the process. It also aims at becoming the most secure, stable and scalable platform; and to recapture top 6 coin glory again according to market capitalization.

Zilliqa on the other hand aims at transforming the way smart contracts are writen by introducing the Scilla programming language as well as the concept of Sharding to further scale transactions on the platform. This is a welcome revolutionary vision by the team at Zilliqa.

So why have these three cryptocurrencies and projects on your radar in Q3?

Firstly, all three projects solve the issue of scalabilty that has been plaguing the Ethereum platform. Both Zilliqa and IOSToken aim at introducing sharding which is the division of the mining network into smaller shards each capable of processing transactions in parallel. However, with IOST sharding, the project introduces Efficient Distributed Sharding which makes the shards sufficiently large and strongly bias-resistant via a combination of a client server randomness scavenging mechanism and leader election via cryptographic sortition.

With respect to Tron, the MainNet will achieve 2,000 transactions per second which is 80 times faster than that of Ethereum.

Secondly, the Tron MainNet is currently live and testing will be complete by the 24th of June and just in time for the third quarter of 2018. The ZIL MainNet is also scheduled for launch in the third quarter of 2018. With respect to IOST, the MainNet is still in development with regular updates by the team as we complete the second quarter of 2018. All these projects have dedicated team members who will ensure the MainNets are released as scheduled with products that were promised in their whitepapers.

Thirdly, all these three projects are lucky in that they were founded and initially based in China and Singapore. Both TRON and IOST have their roots in China with Zilliqa having its roots in Singapore.

Therefore, the projects stand to benefit from the recent embracing of Blockchain Technology by the Chinese Government as outlined by the Chinese president, Xi Jinping who was quoted as saying:

A new generation of technology represented by artificial intelligence, quantum information, mobile communications, internet of things and blockchain is accelerating breakthrough applications.

This statement by President Jinping is the much needed motivation for any blockchain project in the region. China had initially placed a ban on cryptocurrency trading and ICOs. These statements by President Jinping are a clear indication that we are at the cusp of a change in attitude by the Chinese government towards the industry and possibly embracing it completely.

With respect to the crypto-market value of IOST, TRX and ZIL, all three are decently priced at under a dollar. IOST is currently valued at $0.038; ZIL is valued at $0.12; and TRX currently trading at $0.057 at the moment of writing this. With three projects having exciting road-maps in addition to the factors outlined above, the value of these digital assets is sure to go up as soon as their MainNets are 100% operational.

Disclaimer: This article is not meant to give financial advice. It is an opinion piece. The opinion herein should be taken as is. Please carry out your own research before investing in any of the numerous cryptocurrencies available.