The consumer electronics giant Sony introduced its own Ethereum L2, dubbed Soneium, on Friday. Testnet deployment is set to go live in the coming weeks.

The announcement was well received amid the crypto market’s increasing lamentation of infrastructural bloat and lack of consumer applications. 

The details around actual onchain use-cases are still vague, but Sony’s focus seems to be centered around creators. The official Soneium blog emphasized “protection of rights to creativity created by creators”, and “new mechanisms for returning profits to support creators and fans.”

Sony intends to build Soneium with Optimism’s rollup development kit “OP Stack”, which already boasts 29 L2 chains in its Superchain ecosystem, based on L2Beat.

The company will launch the L2 chain under Sony Block Solutions Labs. This is a joint venture between Sony Group Corporation and Startale, a Singapore-based blockchain infrastructure startup that raised $3.5 million in June 2023.

Startale helped develop the Astar Network zkEVM chain, which is planned to transition to Soneium.

Source: Donovan Choy – blockworks.co