The cryptocurrency market has recently seen growing interest in an emerging trend—the development of parallelized Ethereum Virtual Machines (EVMs). Parallelized EVM technology is promising major improvements in blockchain scalability through parallel transaction processing. But is the hype justified or is this just another crypto fad?

Focused Attention on Parallelized EVM Trend

An EVM is the software that handles computation and data storage on the Ethereum blockchain network. The EVM processes smart contract code and executes transactions on the network. Ethereum’s EVM utilizes sequential transaction ordering, however, which limits its ability to scale.

Parallelized EVMs seek to break this bottleneck by enabling parallel transaction execution across multiple processors. This allows for higher throughput and lower latency compared to sequential processing.

2024 will be the year of the parallel evm – rooting for everyone working on this problem incl. monad/sei/polygon and other teams that I forget.

also excited for our own internal efforts there and pushing the boundaries on database design

— Georgios Konstantopoulos (@gakonst) December 11, 2023

As New York-based crypto investment firm DBA co-founder Jon Charbonneau explains, there are two main approaches for building parallelized EVMs—deterministic and speculative parallel execution. The deterministic method uses predefined transaction ordering to avoid conflicts, while speculative scheduling speculatively runs transactions in parallel, managing conflicts as they arise.

Proponents argue that parallelized EVMs can optimize blockchain performance and efficiency. By splitting workloads across multiple processors, these parallelized systems can handle far greater transaction volumes, enabling greater application scalability, and reducing network congestion and high gas fees during peak usage.

The Promise of Faster, More Efficient Blockchains

Parallelized EVM projects have rapidly grown in popularity as the crypto market focuses on their potential benefits. Leading projects like SEI and NEON have seen surging adoption and valuations this year.

The crypto community views these technologies as crucial for addressing fundamental limitations in blockchain scalability. As decentralized apps (DApps) and user bases expand, parallel execution is seen as critical for meeting demands.

I think many established L1s/L2s are now facing existential crisis from inscription spamming causing gas like $AVAX to go to $50-$100 per tx, completely destroying their core values. This prob is only going to get worse, & explains why $SEI daily is up 10% while alts are nuked. https://t.co/uUUN0NWxZh

— Sell When Over | 9000.sei (@sell9000) December 18, 2023

Parallelized EVMs can open the door to sophisticated decentralized finance (DeFi) products not feasible on current networks. By powering faster and cheaper transactions, these could enable the next generation of blockchain technology.

Technical Hurdles and Adoption Risks

Building functioning parallelized systems requires overcoming complex technical obstacles, however. Ensuring predictable, conflict-free parallel execution across thousands of decentralized nodes is challenging.

There are also questions about ecosystem adoption. While Ethereum is transitioning to integrate optimized rollup technologies, it can take time. And some applications may be difficult to migrate.

The rise of parallelized EVMs and rollups represents a key juncture for blockchain tech. These innovations address innate limitations in sequential transaction processing that have long-constrained performance.

If successfully implemented, parallelized EVMs could future-proof blockchain networks. They could provide the pathway for Ethereum and other crypto networks to keep pace with soaring demands.

While technical and adoption risks exist, the crypto market is betting on parallelized EVMs becoming a cornerstone of the next-generation Web3 infrastructure. Their success could determine whether blockchains can truly scale to mainstream levels.