Dialogue with Polygon Co-founder: How was the $10 billion market cap Ethereum Layer 2 aggregator created?

This article was published on Babbit News, original title: "Exclusive | Interview with Polygon Founder: From 'Matic' to Ethereum Layer 2 Aggregator, How a $10 Billion Market Cap Was Forged," Author: Overnight Porridge

In the past month, the circulating market cap of Polygon (formerly MATIC) has grown from $3 billion to over $13.3 billion, making the Indian "Matic" a dark horse in the recent crypto asset market. So what exactly has happened behind the scenes?

In this regard, Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal shared the story of founding the project and transforming it into an Ethereum Layer 2 aggregator.

Question:

Hello, Sandeep, thank you very much for being here. We look forward to asking you some questions.

Sandeep:

Thank you, I really appreciate it, and we are looking forward to this conversation as well.

Question:

So, before we talk about Polygon (formerly Matic), could you introduce yourself and talk about what you did before? I know you were the CEO of Scope Weaver and then the e-commerce CTO at Welspun Group.

Sandeep:

Yes, of course. Let’s start from the beginning. After completing my engineering studies, I worked as a software engineer for two years at a computer science company. Then I specialized in technical management, and later I joined Deloitte Consulting, where I worked for less than a year. After that, I joined Welspun Group, one of the largest textile groups in India. The company then established an e-commerce division, where I served as the CTO, responsible for all the tech stack and enterprise integration, etc.

But I had a small startup even early on, during my last year of studies, where I helped some clients. I mean, one of our big clients was the ruling party BJP in India. So their Delhi division hired us to analyze data from the election commission from previous years. After that, I also created some small startups, so I always wanted to do something on my own.

Even those leadership roles, like at Welspun Group, gave me the confidence that I could do this. I also built Scope Weaver, which is basically a B2B service marketplace; you can think of it as Alibaba, but it focuses on service providers rather than freelancers. But due to the nature of the projects (which were very business-intensive), I realized I needed at least 10 people to manage it, and I couldn’t delegate it to subordinates.

So I realized it was hard to scale, and then I started thinking about doing something in the tech space. Initially, I tried artificial intelligence (AI), but there was too much math involved, and I thought, well, I don’t want to do this. Then I started looking around, and by late 2015 or early 2016, Bitcoin had a rebound, and there was some noise around it, and I thought, okay, let me give it a try. I started reading the blockchain bible, which is "Mastering Bitcoin" by Andreas Antonopoulos, and by the time I got to the fourth chapter, I felt it wasn’t just a currency but a great technology that could actually change the way we interact as humans. Like many others, that’s how I fell down the rabbit hole. Since then, I’ve been getting deeper and deeper into it.

So I started becoming a blockchain developer. Initially, some clients consulted me to build dapps and ICO solutions for them. Then, you know, when the CryptoKitties movement happened, you saw the scalability bottleneck of Ethereum, and you needed more solutions to scale Ethereum. That’s when I met my co-founder, who also came from the community.

Question:

Yes, can you briefly outline the history of Matic? Then, why did you decide to rename it to Polygon, and what is the difference between the two? What kind of person are you, and what goals are you striving to achieve?

Sandeep:

Sure. So basically, when we started, Joseph Poon was still the author of the Lightning Network, and at that time, they proposed the Plasma scalability solution, which had a lot of hype in the industry and was touted as the next scalability solution for Ethereum. Talig was very closely involved in that project, and my co-founder Jaynti Kanani was also involved. So when we founded Matic, we realized that what we needed to pursue was adoption, not tech hype or anything like that. So we realized that for this UTXO-based model, no one would use it. It would be a simple payment mechanism. No users would use it, and developers wouldn’t use it either because they needed mature smart contracts, not just payments.

So JD [Jaynti Kanani] came up with the idea that we should have a Plasma solution based on EVM. So the journey of Matic started from there. We kind of deviated from the original plasma implementation and said it should be an EVM-based plasma implementation. Our final mainnet was launched in May 2020, and since then, the network has gained amazing traction.

While I was leading the business team at Polygon, we talked to a lot of developers. I shouldn’t say there were thousands, but at least a few hundred… We realized that there wasn’t a one-size-fits-all solution, and then these scalability solutions would ultimately commoditize. The community shifted from one hype to another, like it was state channels, then plasma, then optimistic rollups, and then ZK-Rollups, along with different solutions like Validium.

We realized that we wanted to build a long-term sustainable solution. We didn’t want to build a network that started being used and then a few months later, no one cared about it, and it just died.

Question:

Can you briefly outline what Polygon is and explain what attracted you to try to create a protocol for building and connecting Ethereum-compatible blockchain networks?

Sandeep:

Polygon effectively transforms Ethereum into a mature multi-chain system (also known as the blockchain internet). This multi-chain system is similar to Polkadot, Cosmos, Avalanche, etc., but it has at least three main advantages:

• It can fully benefit from Ethereum's network effects;

• It is inherently more secure;

• It is more open and powerful;

Question:

Now let’s discuss the features Polygon offers to developers, including ETH compatibility, scalability, and security, as well as many other features that make Polygon stand out. Can you elaborate a bit more and explain some of Polygon's features to our readers?

Sandeep:

Polygon will support major Layer 2 solutions such as Optimistic Rollup, zkRollup, Validium, etc., thus becoming a unique "Layer 2 aggregator."

You can find related information here:

• Polygon Explanation Video

• What is Polygon and Why It Matters

• Polygon Official More Important

Question:

Now let’s discuss projects based on Polygon. Some very exciting projects like Polymarket, Aavegotchi, and Decentral Games are using the Polygon architecture. Can you talk about this and your vision for future developments?

Sandeep:

Over 150 Dapps, including Aave, Curve, Polymarket, Aavegotchi, OpenSea, NeonDistrict, Cometh, and Quickswap, have chosen Polygon to scale their applications. You can find the complete list at awesomepolygon.com.

Question:

As a final question about Polygon, can you tell us what Polygon's long-term vision is?

Sandeep:

Polygon is open and powerful, primarily in terms of the types of architectures it can support. This is because (1) Polygon is built on the foundation of Ethereum, so it can essentially encompass any scalability or infrastructure solution within the Ethereum ecosystem; (2) we fully embrace Ethereum's spirit of open innovation and make it one of our main design goals for Polygon.

The mission of Polygon will always be to scale Ethereum and bring the power of blockchain and crypto to more users.

Question:

Who is someone you respect? What inspiration does this person give you?

Sandeep:

Vitalik Buterin. His breadth and depth on various topics are inspiring. Some people have deep knowledge in very few subjects, while others have shallow knowledge on a wide range of topics, but Vitalik has deep knowledge across various disciplines, which makes him as fascinating as Elon Musk.

Question:

So far, what do you think are the three key factors to your success? For example, your work ethic?

Sandeep:

The ability to get things done, respect for team members and others, and focus.

Question:

Besides the blockchain field, are there other industries you are particularly interested in, such as artificial intelligence?

Sandeep:

I think we are still in the early stages of the blockchain industry, akin to the internet's development in 2003-2004, so I want to put all my energy into this.

Question:

Thank you very much for taking the time to talk with us today.

Sandeep:

Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity.