The NEM Foundation has announced the launch of the public testnet and rebranding of its blockchain platform developed under the codename “Catapult” to “SYMBOL.” The testnet launch is in preparation for the mainnet scheduled to go live in the first half of 2020.
SYMBOL from NEM is a full-featured solution for enterprises supported by a plugin engine that allows effortless interoperability and configuration. SYMBOL’s plugins enable digital asset creation, decentralized swaps, multi-level multi-signature accounts, advanced account systems, business logic modeling, and interaction between public and private data.
“SYMBOL is built for scale with frictionless onboarding and adoption for developers and faster POC to production development. We’re excited to welcome the community and partners to participate in our testnet in preparation for becoming validators on our mainnet.”
– Chief Technical Officer of NEM Foundation Nate D’Amico
As unveiled during the successful NEM community vote, SYMBOL embodies a new brand and direction for NEM’s enterprise-focused blockchain solution, which reached feature complete status at the end of 2019. In addition to the public release of SYMBOL as a brand, the NEM Foundation invites developers and enthusiasts to join the SYMBOL public chain testnet.
“Our goal is to transform the way enterprises do business. We sought to build a secure and flexible solution that reduces costs and business friction, increases trust, and expands the flow of ideas to accelerate innovation. The SYMBOL blockchain does all this for a multitude of industries.”
– NEM Foundation President Alexandra Tinsman
XEM/SYMBOL Tokens
Following the launch of the SYMBOL token, the XEM token will remain as a functioning currency on the NIS1 platform. SYMBOL will coexist alongside the original NIS1 chain — a token allocation opt-in process is currently underway. Current XEM token holders may elect to opt-in on a 1:1 basis for their SYMBOL tokens before or after the snapshot of XEM balances is taken. After the snapshot has occurred the opt-in period will be several years.