Germany’s Deutsche Telekom plugs in as polygon validator

One of Europe’s largest telecommunications companies is using its infrastructure as a validator for blockchain protocols to explore new revenue streams and boost network security.

Germany’s Deutsche Telekom is set to become a validator for Ethereum layer-2 scaling platform Polygon, becoming one of 100 validators providing staking and validation services to the network and Polygon’s Supernet solution.

Polygon has become an important Layer 2 within the Ethereum (ETH) ecosystem, providing developers with a range of scaling solutions, including zero-knowledge rollups, sidechains, and data availability protocols.

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Deutsche Telekom MMS, which provides consulting and software development services, will serve as the polygon validator for its parent company. This is expected to secure Polygon’s proof-of-stake sidechain and supernet chain, improving security, governance and decentralization of the protocol.

The firm will run a full node, produce blocks, validate and participate in network consensus as well as commit checkpoints for the Ethereum mainnet.

Dirk Rode, head of the Blockchain Solutions Center at Deutsche Telekom, told Cointelegraph that endorsing the Polygon Network as a validator is a major milestone in its aim to become a significant player in the Web3 infrastructure:

“Deutsche Telekom is not only a well-known infrastructure provider for mobile and Internet services, but is also making significant commitments to expand its presence and credibility as an infrastructure provider in the Web3 domain.”

Deutsche Telekom is also a validator for the Q, Flow, Celo, Chainlink and Ethereum blockchains, and Rode said the company aims to serve institutional clients as a trusted enterprise-grade staking provider.

Rhode said that leveraging the company’s infrastructure as a validator provides Deutsche Telekom with a ‘reliable, novel and scalable source of income’ while monetizing the underlying blockchain network’s native tokens.

The prospect of more mainstream telecommunications companies moving to Web 3 could also serve as a catalyst for greater decentralization of the various proof-of-stake blockchains that are operated by validators:

“Other telecom companies are also exploring opportunities in this domain. A diverse and trusted validator set should be the goal in a decentralized ecosystem.

This was reiterated in a statement by Michael Blank, CEO of Polygon Labs, highlighting his belief that the partnership could pave the way for more mainstream businesses to adopt blockchain technology.

Polygon recently announced a multi-year partnership with Google Cloud to drive the development of the Ethereum scaling protocol’s zkEVM, a zero-knowledge proof scaling solution.

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