What’s Going on with IOTA?

A Brief Technological and Financial Overview

As cryptocurrency and distributed ledger technology continue to enter further into mainstream technological
and pop cultural spheres, Bitcoin isn’t the only crypto token that people have heard of anymore. In fact, a
growing number of ‘altcoins’ have made their way into the public eye as promising investments and
technological advances.

One of these cryptocurrencies is IOTA (mIOTA). Created by David Sønstebø, Dominik Scheiner, Serguei
Popov, and Sergey Ivancheglo, the network has been slated as a revolutionary technology for the Internet of
Things and machine-to-machine (m2m) communication.

In fact, the ‘IOT’ in ‘mIOTA’ stands for ‘Internet of Things’ (IoT); the ‘m’ refers to a classification in the SI
system of measurement. (There has been some dispute over what the ‘A’ stands for.)

A growing number of use cases have been developed for IOTA. For example, the network could be integrated
into smart power grids in such a way that every watt and command would be recorded. Owners of solar
panels that produce extra electricity could be paid for every watt they produce in real time. Not only does this
enable more efficient energy uses, it also provides an opportunity to easily collect precise data that could be
analyzed and monetized.

<h2>Why is IOTA So Well-Suited for IoT Integration?</h2>

There are several features of the network that have been implemented to make it highly suitable for integration
with the Internet of Things, microtransactions, and m2m (machine to machine) communication: namely, the
IOTA network has no fees, and is highly scalable. The IOTA network has also been developed to be resistance
to hacks from quantum computers.

The IOTA network’s scalability is made possible because of the unique form of DLT (distributed ledger
technology) that powers it. The IOTA network does not run on a blockchain--instead, it operates on something
called a ‘Tangle.’

The Tangle does not use miners or forgers to validate its transactions. Rather, every transaction that is added
to the Tangle automatically validates two previous transactions. Therefore, the network is (essentially) infinitely
scalable--the more transactions that <em>do</em> take place on the IOTA network, the more transactions
<em>can</em> take place on the IOTA network.

There has been some criticism of the IOTA network. Some voices in the cryptocurrency community have
raised concerns that the network is overly centralized; scientists at MIT published a report detailing issues they
had discovered with IOTA’s software in late 2017.

<h2>A Growing Number of Partnerships for the IOTA Foundation</h2>

In spite of the criticism, however, the Berlin-based IOTA Foundation has garnered a number of high-profile
partnerships and collaborations since its establishment several years ago. The Foundation is a non-profit
organization created with the specific purpose of “[developing] the next generation of protocols for the
connected world.”

Most recently, the IOTA Foundation partnered with UNOPS (the United Nations Office for Project services) to
explore how the IOTA network could be used to increase the efficiency of UNOPS’ operations. Yoshiyuki
Yamamoto, UNOPS Special Advisor on Blockchain Technology, said in an official statement that “we share a
vision where machines, devices, sensors and people connect and communicate to each other - it's the world of
'Industry 4.0.'”

Additionally, the IOTA Foundation created a data marketplace with more than twenty participating companies
(including Fujitsu and Microsoft) near the end of 2017. The Foundation also formed a partnership with the
International Transportation Innovation Center (ITIC) to work on creating autonomous vehicle testbeds.

Most recently, IOTA was added as a tradeable asset on eToro, a UK-based investing platform that offers its
users the ability to trade cryptocurrencies, stocks, ETFs, currencies, indices, and commodities. Traders on
eToro can also set up their portfolios to automatically copy the trades of leading investors.

<h2>IOTA as an Ivestment</h2>

IOTA’s price is still largely determined by speculation. In other words, the IOTA network has not yet been
implemented for use on any kind of widespread scale--therefore, the value of IOTA tokens is largely
determined by investor’s beliefs about the future of the network.

The price of IOTA also moves in tandem with the cryptocurrency markets at large. In other words, when the
cryptocurrency markets are bullish, IOTA is often also bullish. The opposite is true as well--when the markets
are in the midst of a downward bend, IOTA is also likely to be losing value.

The addition of IOTA onto eToro on August 20th had a positive effect on IOTA’s valuation in the short term
sense--the cryptocurrency moved from roughly $0.51 to nearly $0.79. The price has since cooled to $0.58, but
it appears that another bullish run is underway.