Rootstock Creates Smart Contract Alliance RSK, 25 Bitcoin Companies Including BTCC Announce Joining

The development of Bitcoin smart contracts is also beginning to move towards a "cooperative" model.

Twenty-five multinational bitcoin companies have confirmed they have signed a letter of intent to collaborate on a smart contract platform for the bitcoin blockchain.

The RSK (Rootstock) Alliance is built on the network of smart contract startup Rootstock.

Diego Gutiérrez Zaldívar, co-founder and CEO of Rootstock, told CoinDesk that the alliance represents “an awakening in the bitcoin ecosystem” and demonstrates the usefulness of sidechains, a technology developed by bitcoin startup Blockstream that aims to enhance the functionality of the bitcoin network.

The extension of the Bitcoin network allows us to solve some of the most important challenges with a more diverse scripting language. In the long run, we can overcome Bitcoin’s inherent weaknesses while protecting its intrinsic value.

The 25 companies include exchanges Bitfinex, BitGo, Bitstamp and BTCC, and wallet providers BitPay, JAXX, Xapo and BitOasis.

Rootstock claims to be the first Turing-complete smart contract platform in the Bitcoin network, using a "hybrid" security model that includes both PoW and private network models.

Rootstock co-founder Gabriel Kurman told CoinDesk:

The RSK Federation will contribute to real-world use cases for smart contracts.

Rootstock released the test network Lotus in May this year. However, its project plan shows that it will take another year for the platform's smart contracts to be used for enterprise-level solutions.

Member support

In order to shorten this one year, the RSK Alliance’s work is more than just signing a letter of intent.

Wences Casares, founder of bitcoin wallet company Xapo, said he believes that once the enterprise version of Rootstock is released, it will surpass Ethereum smart contracts because the two have similar functions, but Rootstock is built on the more powerful and stable Bitcoin blockchain.

In order to launch the Rootstock smart contract as soon as possible, Casares said Xapo will do its best to cooperate with Rootstock. After signing the letter of intent, Xapo will provide wallet services for Rootstock platform tokens and assign several employees to assist Rootstock's work.

We are all Rootstock’s soldiers in this war (the battle of smart contracts). So we follow their instructions.

The 25 companies in the RSK Alliance are all from the Bitcoin industry, but their businesses are not limited to Bitcoin. For example, the JAXX wallet is suitable for any cryptocurrency; and BitGo provides security services for various blockchains.

More than just cryptocurrencies

At the same time, Ethereum was severely damaged by the hard fork, and the establishment of the RSK Alliance at this time has a good chance of dealing a major blow to Ethereum's competitor.

But Kurman said all this was coincidental. Some members of the RSK Alliance also provide Ethereum services.

Our goal is to provide financial services to the world's poor. We will not rush to release a smart contract platform for the sake of immediate benefits, nor do we want to build our own happiness on the pain of others.

Anthony Di Iorio, CEO of JAXX and former founder of Ethereum, said in an interview that Bitcoin smart contracts can make its blockchain ecosystem more stable.

BitGo co-founder and CTO Ben Davenport said:

Customers have always had a huge influence on our company’s decisions, but this time is different, and we appreciate the Rootstock team and their smart contract use cases.

Kurman concluded:

The establishment of the RSK Alliance represents the Bitcoin community’s shared goal. This is an important moment in the history of Bitcoin development.

Tumeric is the new version of Rootstock’s test network, which will be released in September 2016. In addition, the ginger network will also be released in the first quarter of next year.

RSK Alliance members have now signed a letter of intent, and the official document will be released by the end of this year.