Polygon enters partnership with Near Protocol

Polygon has announced its intention to collaborate with the Near Protocol. This collaboration could help connect Wasm chains to the Ethereum-ecosystem.

Since the advent of Ethereum, the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) been the standard for protocols running on the Ethereum network. The introduction of Wasm chains is going to provide an opportunity to migrate from EVMs. To enable this transition, Polygon and Near Protocol are joining forces to bridge the gap between these systems.

Polygon and Near Protocol announce partnership

Polygon and Near Protocol announced Wednesday that the two companies will jointly develop a zkWasm prover. The zero-knowledge (zk) prover for the Wasm blockchains will bridge the gap between the Wasm network and the Ethereum network.

Wasm, also known as WebAssembly, is a framework used for running complex programs in a browser. It is considered a viable replacement for EVM because it offers more flexibility and interoperability, supports more languages and offers a broader toolset than the Ethereum Virtual Machine.

About the partnership, Polygon founder Sandeep Nailwal said the following, "The zkWasm prover maximizes developer customizability, meaning projects can choose from a number of provers when building with Polygon CDK, whether that's launching or migrating an EVM chain, or building a Wasm chain for closer alignment with Ethereum and access to liquidity.

NEAR protocol closer to Ethereum

In addition to developing a broader ecosystem, this partnership would bring the NEAR protocol closer to Ethereum, allowing Wasm chains to tap Ethereum liquidity. Given that NEAR Foundation has also joined Polygon Labs as a key contributor to Polygon CDK (Chain Development Kit), the growth potential is high.