Solana project launches delayed due to extended network congestion

New projects, especially those planning token launches, have been put on hold until the technical difficulties around Solana’s network congestion and transaction errors are resolved.

Intermittent congestion on the Solana blockchain has forced several crypto projects to postpone their launches. Solana developers say they are working on a fix by April 15. 

Users of the Solana blockchain reported increasing issues around network congestion and transaction errors over several weeks. New projects, especially those planning token launches, decided to hold off until the technical difficulties were resolved.

Some Solana projects that waited for a congestion resolution included a nonfungible token (NFT) project, Suit Up, altcoin project DuckCoin and Solana staking rewards platform Surge Finance.

On April 6, Anza, a Solana-focused software development shop, laid out its plan to address the network congestion on its Solana validator client implementation, Agave.

Initial investigations pointed to issues around QUIC implementation, a general-purpose transport layer network protocol, as the root cause. The developers said:

“Anza engineers, with other core contributors, have been working around the clock to diagnose and remedy bottlenecks and increase network performance. Expect more improvements and changes to roll out over the coming months.”

At the time of writing, users have reported experiencing delayed sends for Solana’s SOL (SOL) tokens on the crypto exchange Coinbase.

According to the incident report, Solana has been investigating the issue for over eight hours. However, the issues do not impact the trading and fiat withdrawal and deposit functionality.

Solana co-founder Raj Gokal previously said that “the failed transactions on Solana blockchain have nothing to do with scalability.”

Related: Solana struggles: Record 75% of user txs are failing… or are they?

Amid growing criticism around transaction failures, Fantom network creator Andre Cronje has expressed support for the Solana network.

According to Cronje, the ongoing congestion on Solana stems from the ecosystem’s rapid growth, which has increased demand for block space. Cronje stated that performance issues are technical challenges, not consensus mechanism flaws.

Cronje referred to the Solana network as a victim of success. The uptick in transaction failures was followed by a recent uproar from Solana users on social media, who complained of failed transactions and a degraded user experience.

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