Leading Bitcoin Layer 2 Picks Optimism’s Red-Hot Superchain to Link to Ethereum

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Ethereum layer-2 Optimism’s “Superchain” has added a Bitcoin-native project to its ecosystem for the first time, CoinDesk is first to report.
BOB, a Bitcoin layer-2 project looking to expand development on the world’s oldest blockchain, has integrated with the Superchain ecosystem, built on Optimism’s OP Stack framework.
Under the deal, BOB is expected to receive a grant from the Optimism Foundation currently valued at about $870,000, project officials confirmed to CoinDesk, while cautioning that the amount has not been finalized.
OP Stack is a toolkit that allows developers to build their own blockchains atop Ethereum layer-2 network Optimism.
BOB refers to itself as a “hybrid layer-2” network – built on Bitcoin but with Ethereum compatibility. Its aim is to create bridges between itself and layer-1 blockchains like Ethereum, with the ultimate goal of making Bitcoin the center of decentralized finance (DeFi).
“Joining the Superchain means doubling down on our hybrid vision and ensuring that Bitcoin builders on BOB always have the latest tech out of the box to use in their BTC products,” BOB co-founder Alexei Zamyatin told CoinDesk in a a Telegram message.
Optimism has attracted crypto exchange Coinbase to use OP Stack for its own blockchain, Base, as well as the rival exchange Kraken, which announced its own network, Ink, last week.
CoinDesk broke the news on Tuesday that as part of that deal, Kraken received a grant from the Optimism Foundation of 25 million OP tokens, worth about $42.5 million based on current pricing.
BOB’s price would appear to be lower, having applied for a user incentive grant of 500,000 OP tokens worth $870,000 based on OP’s current price of $1.74. This amount is yet to be finalized and could change, project officials told CoinDesk.
Optimism remains well behind of rival Arbitrum among Ethereum layer-2 projects for total-value locked (TVL). Optimism has a TVL of just over $6 billion, compared to Arbitrum’s $13 billion.
But the wider family of projects using Optimism’s technology total over 40 rollups, with more than $18 billion in TVL.
Read More: Optimism Pushes for ‘Interoperability’ Between Affiliated Blockchains
UPDATE (Oct. 31, 13:55 UTC): Adds that the amount of OP tokens received by BOB from the Optimism Foundation is not yet finalized and could change.
Edited by Bradley Keoun.
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Jamie Crawley is a CoinDesk news reporter based in London.