Top five projects to watch in 2019

It's been a while since I posted an article here, the reason being the bear market that lasted since last year. Meanwhile, it looks like we are witnessing the crypto spring now, and I believe it is time to look at the most promising projects of 2019.

As most of you must know, the ICOs fell into oblivion as the relic of the past, and the latest trend in the crypto sphere is IEOs or Initial Exchange Offerings. Some of the projects already have confirmed IEO's dates, some do not, but definitely they are not to be missed this year.

1. Harmony

The project: A fully scalable blockchain for the decentralized economy. Harmony's deep sharding technology that allows sharding down to the blockchain networking layer that make it stand out from its competitors, including Zilliqa and Solana. Harmony also employs distributed randomness generation to ensure security and reshards the network to prevent attacks. Harmony is based on PoS algorithm and therefore can boast low latency and fees. Moreover, their PoS is adaptive and thresholded ensuring that malicious actors can't get control of the network and at the same time allowing small stakers to participate in it and earn rewards. Mainnet to be launched in June.

The team: All-star team of former engineers from Google, Apple, Microsoft and Amazon.

The sale: Harmony will launch on Binance's Launchpad. The details are expected to be revealed on 15 May. So far, Binance's IEOs have been the most successful. Moreover, the exchange is very picky about the projects it launches, which means that they are almost guaranteed to succeed.

Website: https://harmony.one/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/harmonyprotocol
Medium: https://medium.com/harmony-one
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harmonyoneprotocol/
Telegram: https://t.me/harmony_one

2. Algorand

The project: The main feature of Algorand network is immediate transaction finality, meaning that their blockchain cannot be forked, which should spark interest from enterprises willing to build on Algorand's platform. The volume of computations remains consistent with the growth of Algorand network which translates into the constantly low fees irrespective of the number of users. Algorand's unique Byzantine Agreement protocol provides Algorand's ecosystem with an opportunity to reach consensus and publish the decision immediately.

The team: All-star team from MIT, Harvard and Berkeley. Cryptography pioneer and Turing award winner Silvio Micali as Founder.

The sale: TBD. A few weeks ago, Bgogo announced that Algorand would have IEO on its platform, but that was debunked by the team. Later the project announced that Algorand will "initially enter circulation via a sequence of periodic Dutch Auctions".

Website: https://www.algorand.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Algorand
Medium: https://medium.com/algorand
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/algorand/
Telegram: https://t.me/algorand

3. Polkadot

The project: A blockchain that connects other different blockchains and aims to solve the problem of scalability and isolation. To do that Polkadot will use the Relay Chain, the main chain that other blockchains will connect to, the Parachain, individual blockchains that will run in parallel with the network, and the Bridge Chain, built to connect other blockchains. Its main competitor is Cosmos Network that successfully launched earlier this year and is currently trading at 43x in USD. Mainnet is expected in Q3 2019.

The team: All-star team that includes a Thiel Fellow, Technology Director of the Web3 Foundation and co-founder and former CTO of Ethereum.

The sale: TBD. The first sale happened in 2017. According to the Web3 Foundation, it will distribute up to 20% of Polkadot tokens (DOTs) prior to network launch later this year. There will be a generally available public sale for up to 10%.

Website: https://polkadot.network/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/polkadotnetwork
Telegram: https://t.me/PolkadotOfficial

4. Elrond Network

The project: Elrond uses adaptive state sharding that improves the performance of existing models while achieving a better balance between security, scalability and decentralization. Elrond uses a mixture of PoS and pBFT consensus mechanisms which is similar to Algorand's. However, Elrond promises that in its network, consensus can be reached in 4 seconds in contrast to Algorand's 12 seconds.

The team: Average team with most of the members coming from Romania. Several members seem to have extensive experience in software development/coding and even received some rewards in Romania. Despite the fact that the team might not seem impressive, the project itself looks very strong from the technical standpoint. Moreover, the team looks to raise "just" 4.8m dollars which is very reasonable nowadays.

The sale: TBD. According to the official statement in the Elrond Telegram group, the TGE will take place in 1.5 months from now, and the team is in negotiations with various exchanges about the possible IEO.

Website: https://www.elrond.network/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/elrondnetwork
Medium: https://medium.com/elrondnetwork
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ElrondNetwork
Telegram: https://t.me/ElrondNetwork

5. Coda Protocol

The project: Coda uses a novel architecture of zk-SNARKs and claims to be able to create a compact blockchain that doesn't grow in size as the time goes by. This will allow developers to build "light" applications on the blockchain and ensure sustainability of Coda's blockchain with almost endless capabilities in terms of transactions and number of users.

The team: All-star team made of graduates of Carnegie Mellon, Berkeley and UCLA, and experience working for Pinterest, Facebook, Oracle and Mozilla.

The sale: TBD. The team has recently raised $15m in O(1) Labs from venture funds and currently don't have plans for a public sale. As of now, Coda announced that the wider community will be able to contribute by running nodes or participating in the Ambassador Program details of which will be revealed later.

Website: https://codaprotocol.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/codaprotocol
Medium: https://medium.com/codaprotocol
Telegram: https://t.me/codaprotocol

This article is not a buy/sell recommendation. I am not a financial adviser and you should do your own research before investing in any project.

Thanks for reading, stay tuned for other reviews and feel free to upvote, resteem and follow me!