Tezos

Based in Luxembourg, Tezos offers an open-source blockchain for users to build decentralized assets and applications, deploy smart contracts, and execute peer-to-peer transactions. The Tezos network achieves consensus using proof-of-stake and an on-chain governance model that enables the protocol to be amended when upgrade proposals receive a majority vote from the community. Users can also earn yields from staking the chain’s native token, XTZ. The Tezos network has also been used for NFTs, as an alternative to Ethereum.

As of May 2024, there were around 360 block validating nodes (known as bakers) on the Tezos network with over 5.4 million accounts. As of May 2024, the protocol supported around 85 projects on its network.

 In June 2023, Tezos deployed the network’s 14th upgrade, named “Nairobi.” The protocol claims that the upgrade can speed up transactions by up to 8x (up from its previous capacity of around 1 million transactions per second). Moreover, the upgrade also introduced a new fee mechanism that charges users based on network usage as well as “smart rollups,” a scaling tool that enables faster network usage.

Key customers and partnerships

In February 2023, the company partnered with Google Cloud to add the latter as a validator for its blockchain. The partnership also enabled Google Cloud's enterprise clients to develop and deploy Web3 applications on the Tezos blockchain using Google's cloud infrastructure. Tezos went on to partner with Fireblocks in September 2023 to enable the latter’s customers to securely custody FA1.2 and FA2 token standards on its blockchain. Similarly, the partnership also enabled Fireblock’s institutional clients to leverage its Web3 Engine to build new products and services on the Tezos blockchain. 

In April 2024, Tezos expanded its partnership with Magic, a wallet-as-a-service provider, to streamline user onboarding and authentication for applications built on the network.

Funding and financials

In July 2017, Tezos raised over USD 232 million in the controversial initial coin offering (ICO) of its native cryptocurrency Tez (XTZ), which saw the founders of the protocol face lawsuits by investors who claimed the ICO was an unregistered securities sale. The lawsuits were eventually settled for a sum of USD 25 million in September 2020.