Spikes in gas prices delays growth of new NFT marketplace. Founder of NFT marketplace Cargo, Sean Papanikolas has said that the high gas prices have become a problem for non-fungible token (NFT) marketplaces, especially as they look to mint at scale.
Sean Papanikolas, founder of NFT marketplace Cargo, said that the NFT sector is at an inflection point. But scalability weighs on new players in the sector now that gas prices have spiked. He said “Now, in 2020, platforms are starting to see the scaling issue now due to the spikes in gas prices. Some platforms have halted minting while gas is high and other platforms see a major decline in activity.”
High gas prices have caused some platforms to start working on layer-2 solutions and some are eyeing other chains, leaving Ethereum altogether, warned Cargo’s founder. To counter higher gas fees, Papanikolas said Cargo launched a solution based on ERC-721 and ERC-2309 standards.
But if blockchain companies want to expand their businesses within the NFT landscape, Papanikolas warned it’s not going to be as easy as they think “I think blockchain companies need to be prepared for the level of software engineering effort it will take to overcome the technical hurdles and the limitations of smart contract development on Ethereum and then how those pieces will work with traditional systems. The competition will continue to increase as well.”
[image: Jan Huber]
