With an evident expansion of the global crypto economy underway, the industry of crypto mining has emerged as an integral part of the overall Web3 ecosystem. Jack Dorsey, the founder and former CEO of X (formerly Twitter) has realised the potential of the growing crypto mining business and has forayed into the industry. Dorsey, through his payments firm Block, has announced that the creation of its Bitcoin mining chip has been completed.
Following months of research and development, Block has managed to create a 3nm bitcoin mining chip. The aim of this chip is to decentralise the supply of Bitcoin mining hardware.
“Our mining chip will utilise the most advanced semiconductor process currently available and will deliver the performance required for mining operators of all types to survive and thrive in the fifth mining epoch (the period following the recent fourth halving of the block subsidy) and beyond,” the official post from Block said on April 23.
Moving forward, Block has decided to design a full Bitcoin mining system based on the feedback it has received from the community of miners that it has engaged with over the course of these recent months. The company wishes to address challenges related to pre-sale discovery, purchasing, reliability on mining hardware, maintenance of machines, as well as post-sale supports. To do so, Block has invited industry players to submit their suggestions on these focus points.
“With our Bitcoin mining system, we will build on our product and software development expertise, system engineering competency, supply chain experience, and aftermarket support capability, with tens of millions of devices shipped. We intend to use this experience to bring a compelling, differentiated mining solution to market,” Block’s announcement added.
On a global level, the crypto mining market is projected to swell to the capitalisation of $5.55 billion by 2031, growing at a CAGR of 12 percent in the forecast period (2024-2031), as per market intelligence firm SkyQuest.
There, however, are some roadblocks that are expected to restrict the smooth sailing of crypto miners. For instance, this month, the fourth pre-programmed halving of Bitcoin took place. This has reduced the rewards for miners causing them financial losses. In addition, regulatory challenges and the environmentally detrimental effects linked to crypto mining are other issues that the sector has to work on resolving.