Starknet moves closer to EVM compatibility with upcoming ‘Kakarot’ testnet

StarkNet, a zero-knowledge layer-2 scaling solution for Ethereum, is one step closer to becoming fully Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatible, pending the August testnet launch of Kakarot, a new zkEVM.

On June 3, the Kakarot team announced that it had received new support from Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, Ledger co-founder Nicolas Baca, and StarkWare.

We’ve powered up and entered Super Saiyan Mode. Kakarot Labs has been officially incorporated and has closed a pre-seed round with top tier investors.

Let us highlight our vision, current status and the exciting future ahead. pic.twitter.com/VI8QRdPLfw

— Kakarot zkEVM (@KakarotZkEvm) 2 June 2023

In an interview with Cointelegraph, Kakarot CEO and co-founder Elias Tzartes explained that although Starknet stands out as the leading zero-knowledge roll-up in the Ethereum ecosystem, it is not EVM-friendly, so it has a “barrier of entry”. A kind of hindrance”.

StarkNet is used by developers to scale decentralized applications, transactions, and computation on Ethereum, but it uses its native language, Cairo. According to StarkNet, using Cairo makes it easier and faster to develop, review, and maintain new code.

The downside is that it is not compatible with EVM, which may frustrate some developers.

“The biggest impact of Kakarot is making Starknet EVM compatible.”

“Kakarot is like a Solidity or any language engine right now. Eventually you will be able to embed that engine within Starknet to make it compatible with EVMs.”

Currently, StarkNet runs its own custom smart contract virtual machine called the “Cairo VM” which leverages its native coding language, Cairo. This means that StarkNet does not have direct EVM compatibility, which could prove to be a significant bottleneck for overall rollup performance.

“Some teams really need to be able to use Solidity. For example, if someone wrote a DEX or AMM for the Ethereum ecosystem and now 60,000 lines of code are already audited, ready to go, but that’s only on the EVM chain.

If these developers wanted to start using StarkNet, they would have to hire a whole new dev team, rewrite, re-audit the code, and maintain two code bases, which Tzarts described as “prohibitively expensive”. describes as

Connected: More TPS, less gas: Ethereum outlines L2 Starknet performance upgrade

According to Tzartes, the idea of ​​zkEVM first came up during a StarkWare conference in July 2022. By October, the development team was able to work on the new zkEVM together for a week during a Hacker House event in Lisbon, Portugal.

Two months and 20 days later in December, coding for the project was completed, and a fully functional execution stage was reached – all of which was achieved without any venture funding.

Specifically, Tzartes said that Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterny later invested in Kakarot because of his enthusiasm for the multiple-ZKEVM approach to building the Ethereum ecosystem.

“For Vitalik, the more zkEVMs there are, the better, because as long as you have a broad diversity of architecture and diversity of approaches…it’s really good for the space as a whole.”

Tzartes shared that the testnet version of Kakarot will be launched for public use in August this year.

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