Nubit and Merlin Chain Partner to Innovate on Bitcoin Data Availability
Increasing demand for Bitcoin L1 assets shows the need for a more efficient data availability layer
Bitcoin Builders,
Welcome back to the Bitcoin Builders Association Newsletter where we attempt to find some signal in the increasingly busy Bitcoin Builder ecosystem.
This week, we’re highlighting a partnership between Nubit and Merlin Chain.
Nubit, the first Bitcoin-native data availability layer, is a new project launched in early 2024. Their early documentation highlights the problem they’re solving — Bitcoin inscriptions have led to over 14GB of data being stored on the blockchain, leading to high costs. Nubit aims to bring an “efficient and cost-effective data availability layer.”
Their partnership with Merlin Chain (a native Bitcoin Layer 2 powered by bitmap.tech) aims to leverage Nubit’s data availability solutions to make Merlin Chain more efficient and scalable. This will lower fees for the increasingly popular Bitcoin native assets, protocols, and products on Bitcoin’s Layer 1.
Meta Protocols and Layer 1:
Bitcoin Ordinals continue to gain attention. Earlier this week, NodeMonkes (briefly) overtook Bored Ape Yacht Club. NodeMonkes has a market capitalization of around $450 million and is joined by the new NFT project, Runestone (market capitalization of $380 million). These changes highlight Bitcoin's increasing cultural significance.
Layers and Rollups
The Stacks Community approved the Stacks Nakamoto Upgrade. The Nakamoto Upgrade is a significant update for the Stacks ecosystem that promises fast transactions and final Bitcoin settlement.
Anduro, the Marathon Digital Bitcoin L2, announces Alys, a Bitcoin Layer 2 solution built for institutions. The Layer 2 focuses on real-world-asset tokenization and is partnering with Building on Bitcoin to bring it to market.
Mercury Layer protocol, a statechain developed by CommerceBlock, is integrating statechains with the Lightning Network. This functionality, called Lightning Latch, facilitates swapping a Statechain for a Lightning payment in a similar manner to statechain-to-statechain swaps.
Botanix Labs and Yala Labs partner to enhance decentralized financial (DeFi) services through the Botanix EVM.
More Stories
Bitcoin Layers released its research platform and risk framework for tracking Bitcoin scaling solutions. We’re excited to follow this resource for the latest in the Bitcoin builder ecosystem.
We love tracking Bitcoin Layers as a category. We believe that building on Bitcoin is an incredible opportunity to improve its functionality and, in turn, grow the Bitcoin network. Coingecko, a top cryptocurrency data aggregator, has joined the conversation by publishing What Are Bitcoin Layer 2s and Top Bitcoin Layer 2 Projects.