Anatoly Yakovenko started the multi-billion-dollar blockchain ecosystem that was used to launch at least 7 crypto unicorns in less than 2 years. Here's how he did it. (2025)

Anatoly Yakovenko's startup developed Solana, a layer-1 blockchain that led to a multi-billion-dollar crypto ecosystem in less than five years. The software that Solana Labs created allowed founders to build seven crypto unicorns and the layer-1 later notched itself as the ninth largest blockchainby market cap in the industry.

The 41-year-old's idea began at a San Francisco cafe with two coffees, a beer, and a night of working until 4 a.m., cofounder Yakovenko told Insider. Crypto's ecosystem looked very different at the time and Yakovenko, who worked as a systems engineer at semi-conductor giant Qualcomm, was taking notes.

Ethereum had gone live just two years earlier and its token was trading near $7 at the start of 2017. Meanwhile, its network was clogged and slowed down by early blockchain game CryptoKitties, better thought of as "decentralized Tamagotchi." And MetaMask, the now-popular Ethereum wallet, couldn't go longer than a few weeks without user complaints.

"I had a eureka moment," Yakovenko said, adding that he could develop something to improve some of the technical issues other blockchains faced. "That's what really pushed me over the edge."

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Thus ensues the "proof-of-history" protocol, which is what sets Solana's blockchain apart from Bitcoin or Ethereum. The protocol develops a kind of "synchronized clock that, in essence, assigns a timestamp for each transaction and disables the ability for miners and bots to decide the order of which transactions get recorded onto the blockchain," according to TechCrunch. Solana runs on proof-of-stake and the Nakamoto Consensus, but the proof-of-history is an accelerator added on to this. This, per Yakovenko, allows Solana to have cheaper fees and quicker transactions times.

Solana is currently processing 2,745 transactions per second, per its website, while Ethereum can do roughly 30 transactions in the same time frame on its network. Ethereum, however, still has a far larger grasp on the nascent space, as the second largest crypto by market value. The network also has a series of upgrades called The Merge which could give it another boost over its alleged competitor.

Raj Gokal later joined Yakovenko as cofounder, along with Qualcomm alumni Greg Fitzgerald and Stephen Akridge. Yakovenko says part of the reason for Solana's success is attributed to bringing on "rockstars" that he was able to pull from his network.

"We have the best team in crypto at the time, in terms of experience and understanding of how network protocols work and how operating systems work," Yakovenko said.

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Solana's do or die moment

The project's success, however, was not linear.

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Solana's mainnet went live in March, 2020. Its auction was three days after the coronavirus was declared a global pandemic and the same week of the infamous "Black Thursday" crash, where bitcoin slashed half of its value in a day.

"That was a really, really stressful time. We barely got everything to work and the macro seemed like everything was going to die," he said. "It was kind of a do or die moment for us and for the network."

Yakovenko said the company had no more than 22 months of runway at a time, adding that they were just trying to survive for years before the last bull market.

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"We launched at the bottom," he said. "I think that part of the reason why it succeeded was because the people that joined our community were the real true believers and die hards. They were paying attention to crypto as the world was kind of setting on fire."

Small boutiques were early investors in Solana like Multicoin. And some of the earliest token buyers received a 4,300-fold increase in their investment. Other ventures firms like Andreessen Horowitz began diversifying portfolios with Solana much later in June 2021, when it closed a $314 million private token sale.

In 2021, Solana's ecosystem began picking up traction. Startups with unicorn valuations built on the blockchain including non-fungible token marketplace Magic Eden, move-to-earn game StepN, decentralized exchange Serum, wallet Phantom, and more.

"It's just not something that I expected," Yakovenko said. "I don't know if the momentum is sustainable, but I would love to see more of those trailblazers like these grow really quickly."

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Crypto billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried, who founded Serum, which is built on Solana, previously told Fortune in an email that the layer-1 has a chance to become a key layer of infrastructure for the future of crypto. "They were by far the most serious [layer 1] we talked to about continuing to scale their blockchain and expand its opportunities," Bankman-Fried said.

Price action isn't a sole indicator of market health, but Solana's native token, SOL, has jumped 85.42% in the past year, according to Messari. In tandem with broader crypto markets and the macro environment, the altcoin has declined 56.56% in the past three months.

Critics says Solana's network, however, is too centralized due to its token distribution.The layer-1 also continues to experience outages for hours at a time. In June, validators in the network were not processing new blocks for several hours, resulting in many decentralized apps going offline.

Moving forward, Yakovenko is bullish on both the future of crypto and Solana. He says he wants to help onboard the next one billion users into the space with a web3 mobile phone, called Saga.

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"Almost 7 billion people use smartphones around the world and more than 100 million people hold digital assets - and both of those numbers will continue to grow," Yakovenko said in a statement on June 23.

Anatoly Yakovenko started the multi-billion-dollar blockchain ecosystem that was used to launch at least 7 crypto unicorns in less than 2 years. Here's how he did it. (2025)

FAQs

What are the 8 innovations that make Solana the first web scale blockchain? ›

For developing a decentralized and permissionless network that aligns with the performance of a single node, Solana developed 8 key technologies: Proof of History (POH) – a clock before consensus. Tower BFT – a PoH optimized version of PBFT. Turbine – a block propagation protocol.

Who is the owner of Solana? ›

🌟 Anatoly Yakovenko introduced Ethereum Killer Solana to the crypto world — a secure, scalable, and faster blockchain network. 📚 Yakovenko graduated with a Bachelor of Computer Science from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and has a background in startups and software engineering.

Where is Anatoly Yakovenko from? ›

Anatoly Yakovenko was a kid when he came to the U.S. from Ukraine in the early 1990s. As a teenager, he was enamored with programming, having learned C, his first coding language.

How much was Solana when it first launched? ›

Solana first went public via its initial coin offering (ICO) in April 2020, entering the crypto market at an initial price of $US0. 9511.

What is proof of history in Solana? ›

Solana's Proof of History consensus mechanism verifies the time elapsed between two events. It involves a sequence of computations performed by a cryptographically secure function. This function operates sequentially on a single-core processor, with each output as input for the next computation.

What is anatoly net worth? ›

Net Worth: How Rich Is Anatoly Yakovenko? As of 2023, Anatoly Yakovenko had a net worth of approximately $69 million. However, this has since multiplied, with his net worth now closer to $500 million.

Is Anatoly Yakovenko Russian or Ukrainian? ›

Solana Founder Anatoly Yakovenko was born in Ukraine and moved to the United States.

Who is Solana made by? ›

The cryptocurrency platform is called Solana, while the individual unit is called a sol. Created by Anatoly Yakovenko, Solana operates on a decentralized computer network using a ledger called blockchain.

What makes Solana blockchain unique? ›

Solana distinguishes itself through its advanced technology, offering unparalleled speed, scalability, and cost-efficiency in the cryptocurrency space. Its innovative consensus mechanism, low transaction costs, and growing ecosystem make it a preferred choice for developers and users alike.

What makes Solana scalable? ›

Solana is able to achieve this through its unique Proof of History (POH) consensus model, which makes it a strong fit for dApps that want to support a large user base and high throughput transactions. On the other hand, Solana is seen as more centralized and less secure than Ethereum.

What is the technology behind Solana? ›

Solana's Technology

PoS permits validators (those who validate transactions added to the blockchain ledger) to verify transactions based on how many coins or tokens they hold; PoH allows those transactions to be timestamped and verified very quickly.

What is the new technology in Solana? ›

Additionally, Solana's Blockchain Links, or "blinks," represent another major advancement. This technology allows the embedding of Solana-specific actions into any website user interface, potentially transforming the user experience for Solana applications.

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