In 2017, Block.one, led by Dan Larimer and Brendan Blumer, launched the Entrepreneur Operating System (EOS) protocol, one of the earliest “Ethereum Killers,” aiming to support decentralized finance apps at enterprise scale for a global audience.
It offered the speed, scalability and comparative cheapness that would put it well ahead of Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) for most developers. Yet EOS had the mixed fortune of being somewhat ahead of its time, and all did not go according to plan.
The EOS network was run by block producers (BP) who invested their stake in the infrastructure and community instead of staking EOS tokens. This approach meant the BPs tended to be large consortiums, and it was difficult to add nodes and scale.
In 2019, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission fined Block.one $24 million for failing to register its initial coin offering.
“A number of US investors participated in Block.one’s ICO,” said Stephanie Avakian, co-director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement.
“Companies that offer or sell securities to U.S. investors must comply with the securities laws, irrespective of the industry they operate in or the labels they place on the investment products they offer.”
The EOS forks Telos and Wax continued to thrive but development on EOS dropped by 90% in 2020. According to DappRadar’s 2020 Dapp Industry Report, EOS was down to less than 4,000 active wallets.
In August this year, the troubled history of EOS Network took a turn for something a little more hopeful. After a spotty record of delays, unfulfilled promises and plunging token prices, the EOS Block Producers severed their relationship with Block.one and voted to pursue a new protocol to unite the more powerful forks and block producers.
UX Network (CRYPTO: UTX), Telos (CRYPTO: TLOS) and Worldwide Asset eXchange (CRYPTO: WAXP) joined forces to create the Antelope Protocol, a successor to the aspirations of the EOS Network, ready to succeed where Block.one had failed in its initial…
