It is now official. The decentralized WiFi network, Helium (HNT), is saying goodbye to its own chain and moving to Solana’s, following a vote by its community.
The HIP 70 proposal officially passed Thursday morning, with about 81% voting in favor of moving to Solana.
Community members to be able to participate in the vote stake the Helium currency, the HNT. A two-thirds majority was needed to pass the vote to relocate the network.
Some 6,177 community members voted in favor of the motion making a stake of over 12 million HNT. On the other hand, 1,270 members voted against the motion.
The reasons for moving to Solana
The Helium developers proposed migrating the network to Solana to help scale the protocol through more efficient transactions, as well as interoperability. The move will move all currencies, applications and governance to the Solana network.
“Solana has a proven track record of powering some of the most important decentralized initiatives in the world and it was an obvious choice to partner with us,” said Scott Sigel, COO of the Helium Foundation, adding: “Solana’s transition to the blockchain allows us to focus our efforts on scaling the network rather than managing the blockchain itself.”
Helium coins
The migration will see HNT, MOBILE and IOT coins issued on the Solana network, which will continue to be the currencies in the Helium ecosystem.
Once the migration is complete, a new version of the Helium Wallet app will be available. In addition, the Helium L1 blockchain history will remain public. Users will be able to access the new app by updating their current wallet app. HNT holders can also use other wallets within the Solana ecosystem, such as Phantom or Solflare.
However, although the votes show overwhelming support for immigration, not everyone agreed with the network’s choice to move to Solana.
Last week Borderless Capital, an Algorand-focused VC backed by Helium, suggested the network reconsider its option to move to Solana and instead move to Algorand.
Helium currently has more than 950,000 nodes or hotspots, with users being rewarded with network currency.
