NEON – An Ethereum Virtual Machine For Solana

TL;DR
This week we’ll dive into the Solana Ecosystem and review one of its newest protocols, NEON. Recently launched to the Solana mainnet, NEON is an Ethereum Virtual Machine for Solana designed to solve interoperability issues. The previously named “Ethereum Killer” must be quickly realizing the importance of playing well with others. Seeing the success of EVM Layer 2 projects like Arbitrum and Optimism steal much of Solana’s thunder over the past two years. NEON will hopefully bridge the gap between Solana and Ethereum to allow more EVM-developed projects to launch their protocols on Solana, enabling deeper liquidity and a more scalable DeFi environment for Solana users and reiterating that old saying, “If you can’t beat 'em, join 'em." Learn more about “The Return of Solana”

Solana was initially created to solve interoperability issues found in networks like NEM and NEO. Seeing these well-funded projects unable to tap into the growing liquidity of Ethereum quickly became their greatest flaw. However, for the most part, Solona has operated independently from Ethereum as a non-EVM Layer 1 Network, relying solely on cross-chain bridges to provide the network on and off ramps between Ethereum.

This worked well enough until Solana’s network inefficiencies began rearing their ugly head. Combined with the FTX fallout and a crypto winter, Solana soon saw that bridges alone wouldn’t be enough to take the protocol where it needed to be.

This makes the development and launch of NEON a major step in the right direction for Solana. Allowing products designed for Ethereum, like Uniswap, to function as intended on Solana. All without the need for a complete redesign.