NEM Launches Development Studio Ahead of Major Blockchain Upgrade

The NEM blockchain project is launching a development studio to support its move towards a major protocol upgrade later in 2019.

According to a press release emailed to CoinDesk, the new NEM Studios is being created by NEM Holdings, the non-profit holding company of NEM Ventures, and the NEM Foundation to help with strategy and backend development for NEM's planned "Catapult" protocol upgrade.

Catapult is aimed to provide enterprises with a "High speed, configurable and scalable blockchain solution," the release states.

NEM Studios' development activities are to be funded by NEM Core, and is now seeking to hire a CTO and a development team to assist with building the Catapult Core protocol and API layer.

Chair and trustee of NEM Holdings and chair of the investment committee for NEM Ventures David Shaw - who also advises the Catapult project- will lead NEM Studios as director.

A steering committee comprised of David Shaw, NEM Foundation President Alexandra Tinsman, and Nate D'Amico from NEM's Project Management Committee will lead the "Go-to-market" strategy for the upgrade.

Catapult is planned to become the core NEM code supporting both private and public blockchains.

The news comes soon the NEM Foundation was forced to make major staffing cutbacks following a shortfall in its finances.

The project was also forced to request that around $8 million of NEM reserves be released in stages to support its continued operations.

NEM conference booth image courtesy of NEM Foundation.