Botanix Review: Layer 2 EVM on Bitcoin

Botanix is ​​a Bitcoin Layer 2 project that attracted great attention recently when it raised 8.5 million USD in a funding round with the participation of Polychain Capital and Placeholder.

What is Botanix?

Botanix is an L2 solution that is integrated with the EVM, running as a sidechain around L1 Bitcoin, much the same way as Ethereum’s L2. It also acts, therefore, as a bridge that enhances the security of EVM owing to the robust security features of Bitcoin.

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How Botanix Works

The system will be powered by two major components and several sub-components to create a layer 2 EVM based on Bitcoin. Logically, it acts as a bridge that will let users interact with dapps on Bitcoin, from lending and borrowing to NFT trading.

When a user bridges assets from the Bitcoin blockchain onto the EVM Layer 2 solution, the BTC amount is stored in a multisig wallet and safeguarded by Orchestrator nodes. Users receive equivalent BTC on the Layer 2 platform for use with dapps developed for the project.

• Ethereum Virtual Machine: By being built on the Proof of Stake consensus mechanism and taking advantage of Proof of Work, Botanix’s security will be strongly strengthened. User stakes will be securely stored in multisig wallets on Bitcoin.
• Spiderchain: Spiderchain is a combination of multisigs that ensures the safety of all BTC on Botanix.

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Products

Ethereum Virtual Machine

EVM is the technology performing smart contracts and calculating the state of the network every time a new block is added. It would create, apart from hardware and the node network, layers at the top computing states of the network while transcribing smart contracts in bytecode format so other components understand what is written and the functions to process them accordingly.

This helps smart contracts to be deployed on EVM-integrated chains such as Polygon or Avalanche and can be fully recognized by nodes. Besides, this also allows developers’ dapps and tokens to reach from Ethereum to other EVM-integrated chains.

Spiderchain

Spiderchain is a series of multisig Orchestrators, security will be established through the decentralization of these multisig wallets. The name Spiderchain comes from the fact that each “spider leg” represents a different participant. Each Bitcoin block will be associated with a multisig created by a combination of different participants from the Spiderchain.

Orchestrator node

As for Botanix, the nodes of this project will be called Orchestrator nodes responsible for validating and providing liquidity for both Bitcoin and Botanix sides. When a user bridges BTC to the Botanix EVM, that amount of BTC is sent to a multisig wallet. When users bridge back, Orchestrator is the only unit capable of burning & minting BTC on both the origin and destination chains.

Tokenomics

Currently, there is no official information about the project’s tokenomics.

Team, Investors, and Partner

Team

Botanix Labs was founded by 2 alumni from Harvard – the best university in the world:

• Willem Schroé (CEO & Co-Founder): He holds an MBA from Harvard University and a master’s degree in Electronics – Electrical Engineering from KU Leuven University (Belgium). Previously held a project management position at Exxonmobil (an energy corporation) before establishing Botanix Labs in June 2022.

• Alisia Painter (COO & Co-founder): She also holds an MBA from Harvard University and graduated with a major in Art from Ivery University. Previously held positions related to communications & business development at Adobe, xxTALK (an organization supporting women) before holding the position of director of operations at Botanix Labs.

Investors and Partner

Botanix Labs raised a total of 11.5 million USD in 2 funding rounds to date:

• Round 1 (Pre-Seed – June 1, 2023): Botanix Labs has raised 3 million USD, information about investors is not disclosed.
• Round 2 (Seed Round – May 7, 2024) sought $8.5 million in funding, with participation from notable investment funds including Polychain Capital, Placeholder Capital, Valor Equity Partners, and ABCDE. Additionally, prominent individual investors such as Andrew Kang, Domo (creator of the BRC-20 standard), and Icebergy (creator of Crypto Whalebot) were involved.

The capital raised will be used to develop Spiderchain – a Bitcoin Layer 2 solution compatible with EVM. In addition, Botanix Labs will expand its staff and develop new products.

Roadmap

• Q3/2023: Announcement of Whitepaper for Spiderchain project, with testnet version launched in November 2023.
• Q4/2023: Integrate EVM sidechain, launch Bridge & Faucet.
• Q1/2024: Added BTC staking feature in the new version.
• Q2/2024: Mainnet version launched.
• Q3 & Q4/2024: Added Slashing, Sophisticated UTXO & wallet management features.
• 2025: Launch permissionless staking feature & become fully decentralized Layer 2.

Conclusion

Botanix is ​​a Layer 2 Bitcoin project that has attracted great attention recently as large organizations and investment funds have paid great attention to Layer 2 Bitcoin projects since the beginning of 2024.

CoinCu assesses Botanix as offering strong dApp deployment capabilities, potentially attracting new users and contributing value to the Bitcoin ecosystem. Botanix is expected to generate significant interest in the future.

FAQs

1. What is the potential of Botanix?

• Bitcoin Community: This can reach the vast Bitcoin community of more than 100 million users to attract liquidity for its applications.
• Benefit from the Bitcoin Layer 2 trend: After the explosion of the BRC-20 & Ordinals trend in 2023, Layer 2 Bitcoin projects emerged & attracted the attention of the community and large investment funds in 2024.

2. What are the risks of Botanix?

• Being a new project, the liquidity of DeFi applications may therefore be low.
• High competition: The race between Hybrid Layer 2 solutions (hybrid between Bitcoin & Ethereum networks) is very hot.

3. What is the highlight of Botanix?

• Bitcoin Layer 2 is EVM compatible allowing all DApps that can run in the Ethereum ecosystem to operate on the Bitcoin Layer 2 network.
• High security from Bitcoin Layer 1 through the Proof of Work consensus mechanism.
• High scalable by processing transactions on the sidechain.

DISCLAIMER: The information on this website is provided as general market commentary and does not constitute investment advice. We encourage you to do your own research before investing.