Zilliqa is a public, permissionless blockchain designed to deliver high throughput, capable of processing thousands of transactions per second. It addresses scalability and speed challenges by implementing sharding as a second-layer scaling solution. The platform supports a variety of decentralized applications and enables staking and yield farming. Development of Zilliqa began in June 2017, with its testnet launching in March 2018. The mainnet went live in June 2019. The native utility token of the network, ZIL, facilitates transaction processing and smart contract execution. *(Note: Links to external sources have been removed to maintain an evergreen format.)* Zilliqa was developed by Prateek Saxena, an assistant professor at the National University of Singapore School of Computing. In 2016, Saxena and a group of students published a research paper proposing a sharding-based blockchain to enhance network efficiency and speed. Around that time, Saxena co-founded Anquan Capital with Max Kantelia, a finance and technology entrepreneur, and Juzar Motiwalla, former president of the Singapore Computer Society. In June 2017, the company established Zilliqa Research to build the Zilliqa network. The team included Dong Xinshu as CEO, Yaoqi Jia as chief technology officer, and Amrit Kumar as chief scientific officer—all of whom had previously worked as research fellows at the NUS School of Computing. Zilliqa is a public blockchain that utilizes a sharded network architecture, which it claims enhances scalability by enabling high throughput and faster transaction processing. The platform's design allows each shard to process transactions independently, increasing overall network capacity as more shards are added. Transactions are finalized immediately upon processing, eliminating the need for additional confirmation time. Zilliqa targets enterprise adoption across industries such as advertising, gaming, entertainment, and financial services. According to its 2018 position paper, the platform aims to compete with traditional centralized payment systems like VISA and MasterCard. Anquan Capital and Zilliqa Research, the development team behind Zilliqa, hold substantial reserves of ZIL tokens. The Zilliqa network processes millions of transactions monthly and has demonstrated consistent growth in block production since its mainnet launch. The blockchain has scaled from initially producing around 900 blocks per day to over 2,500 blocks daily. *(Note: Links to external sources have been removed in accordance with the guidelines.)* Zilliqa has a fixed maximum supply of 21 billion tokens. Initially, ZIL was issued as an ERC-20 token during a token generation event, which concluded in January 2018. These tokens were later migrated to the Zilliqa mainnet through a token-swap process completed in February 2020. At launch, 60% of the total supply (12.6 billion ZIL) was allocated for distribution during the token generation event, while the remaining 40% (8.4 billion ZIL) is being introduced through mining. The distribution plan reserved 10% (2.1 billion ZIL) for Anquan Capital, 12% (2.52 billion ZIL) for Zilliqa Research, and 5% for current and future team members. These allocations were scheduled for quarterly distribution over three years. Zilliqa's mining mechanism is structured so that all tokens will be mined within 10 years, with block rewards gradually decreasing. The project's whitepaper outlines that 80% of the total supply (16.8 billion ZIL) is expected to be mined in the first four years, followed by the remaining 20% (4.2 billion ZIL) over the subsequent six years. (Note: Links to external sources have been removed to maintain an evergreen format.) The Zilliqa network is secured through a practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance (pBFT) consensus protocol, which requires at least two-thirds of all nodes to agree on the accuracy of a record before it is added to the blockchain. Transactions are processed by dividing the network into shards, with each shard relying on a group of nodes to validate a subset of transactions. Once consensus is reached within each shard, a separate group of nodes verifies the collective results and adds a new block to the blockchain. The network employs elliptic-curve cryptography to enhance the security of its consensus protocol and supports multisignature functionality. Alongside the pBFT mechanism for transaction validation, Zilliqa also utilizes a proof-of-work algorithm to assign node identities and organize shards. Zilliqa introduced a new programming language called Scilla (Smart Contract Intermediate-Level Language) for its smart contracts. Designed with security in mind, Scilla helps detect and prevent vulnerabilities at the language level, making it easier to formally verify the safety of smart contracts through mathematical proofs. *(Note: Links to external sources have been removed to maintain an evergreen format.)* Zilliqa's native token, ZIL, is available for trading on multiple major cryptocurrency exchanges, including Binance, Huobi, Bitfinex, and Bithumb. It can be traded against fiat currencies, stablecoins, and other cryptocurrencies. If you're looking to buy ZIL or other cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC), DroomDroom provides educational resources to help you understand the process of purchasing digital assets. *(Note: The revised version removes promotional links and exchange-specific references while maintaining the core information about ZIL's availability and general guidance on purchasing cryptocurrencies.)* Learn about Ethereum, the largest blockchain exploring sharding technology. Discover Harmony, a high-throughput blockchain project that also implements sharding. For a deeper understanding of crypto markets, explore DroomDroom’s guide on tokenomics. Stay informed about cryptocurrency trends and insights with DroomDroom’s educational resources.