The Ukrainian-born engineer behind Solana Labs learned to code as a teen and had a 'lightbulb' moment about the blockchain (2024)

Anatoly Yakovenko was a kid when he came to the U.S. from Ukraine in the early 1990s. As a teenager, he was enamored with programming, having learned C, his first coding language. The dot-com boom was in full swing and “there was this magical possibility of writing a piece of code that just solves some incredible problem for the world” and becoming the next Steve Jobs or Bill Gates, Yakovenko tellsFortune, seated at a long table at Solana’s Hacker House in Miami.

Anatoly Yakovenko’s background

Yakovenko was in college when the dot-com bubble popped, and “some advisors literally [told] me, ‘maybe computer science is not a good career choice,’” he says. But Yakovenko stuck with it, and, after a failed startup, landed a job at Qualcomm, where he stayed for nearly 13 years working on distributed systems, among other things, before leaving in 2016, per his LinkedIn.

In 2017, Yakovenko had an idea. He had been working with a friend on a side project to build deep-learning hardware. And to offset the costs of setting up all the graphics processing units being used, the duo began mining crypto. By then, Yakovenko was already well aware of the crypto markets. But one night, as thestorygoes, Yakovenko, riding the highs of two coffees and a beer, wound up staying awake until 4 in the morning and, in the process, had alightbulbidea. The passage of time itself, he realized, could be used as a data structure to helpordertransactions and events on the blockchain—a seemingly wonky conclusion that would turn out to be a part of what has become known as “proof of history,” and a key reason why the Solana blockchain can now operate at lightning-fast speeds compared to Bitcoin and Ethereum. (Solana, in conjunction with Proof of History, uses the consensus mechanism known asProof of Staketo validate transactions on the blockchain.) Yakovenko also brought on several other cofounders, including fellow Qualcomm alumni Greg Fitzgerald and Stephen Akridge.

What is Solana named after?

The endeavor was initially named Loom, but an Ethereum-based project called Loom Network prompted a rebranding. At that time, Yakovenko and several of his cofounders surfed at Solana Beach in California, and Yakovenko says since lots of companies have named themselves after places in the state, he figured they could do that, too. “We were arguing on Slack and eventually I just proposed ‘Solana,’ and that kind of stuck,” he says.

A systems engineer ‘through and through’

Dressed in a gray sweatshirt, shorts, sneakers, and a black baseball cap, Yakovenko looks more like many of the other developers than the CEO of a company.

According to those who know him, Yakovenko is a systems engineer “through and through,” as Ali Yahya, general partner at venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and an investor in Solana, puts it. The way Yakovenko talks is very analytical and technical, with a somewhat paradoxical mix of calm and, at moments, nervous energy.

But since caffeine can make him “too jittery,” his go-to fix is tea, or a decaf Americano. Yakovenko says he now codes in the mornings, and credits surfing or bike rides with helping him think through problems. “If I can get on a bike for two hours, I come back way more refreshed and with a lot of decisions made or internalized,” he says. Yakovenko, like some of the other Solana founders, is also an Ironman and an underwater hockey player. In his prime, he claims he could swim three lengths of the pool with fins on without taking a breath.

That dedication is not just applied to his physical activities. Gokal, who is, as he puts it, “technically COO,” says he first met Yakovenko at his friend and fellow Solana cofounder Eric Williams’ house before the group went on a camping trip together. He recalls Yakovenko, who was working at Qualcomm at the time, was “slumped back in a leather, brown couch and just like, staring off into the distance, probably thinking about some intense problem.”

Gokal, who hails—unlike many of his ex-Qualcomm cofounders—from a healthcare startup, joined as cofounder at the end of 2017, according to his LinkedIn. He says Yakovenko is often so absorbed in his work that “it’s like he’s in another dimension.” Gokal recalls a time in their office when he had dog treats at his desk for his dog Myro, who frequented the workspace. “Toly,” as many call him, “came over to talk to us, and … without even looking, he just stuck his hand in the bag and just started chomping down on whatever was in the bag,” Gokal recounts. “He didn’t notice. He sees all of us burst out laughing, and he’s like, ‘What?’ And we said, ‘You’re eating dog food,’ and he just kept eating,” he laughs.

The above was excerpted from a feature on Solana in Fortune by Anne Sraders and Declan Harty. You can read the complete story, including which big investors think the company has a shot at building a ‘core layer’ of Web3, why Sam Bankman-Fried is a believer, and a host of recent growing pains the company has faced here.

The Ukrainian-born engineer behind Solana Labs learned to code as a teen and had a 'lightbulb' moment about the blockchain (2024)

FAQs

Who is the founder of Solana Ukraine? ›

Anatoly Yakovenko is a co-founder of Solana labs and an integral part of the blockchain community and is famous for providing high-quality capabilities.

Who created the Solana blockchain? ›

Solana was launched in 2020 by Solana Labs, which was founded by Anatoly Yakovenko and Raj Gokal in 2018.

Who coded Solana? ›

Anatoly Yakovenko, a software developer, created Solana, which is named after a tiny Southern California coastal community. Yakovenko suggested this novel cryptocurrency in 2017, Solana will go live in March 2020. Today, SOL is a well-known cryptocurrency, ranking 11th in terms of total market capitalization.

Does Anatoly Yakovenko have a dog? ›

Ada is the beloved dog of Anatoly Yakovenko, the Founder and CEO of Solana.

Who controls Solana? ›

The Solana blockchain is guided by Solana Labs as a core contributor, while also being supported by the Solana Foundation, a Swiss-based non-profit dedicated to growing the community and funding development.

Who is funding Solana? ›

Solana is funded by 48 investors. Cynegetic Investment Management and AngelDAO are the most recent investors.

Is Solana better than Ethereum? ›

Ethereum has low speed and scalability, but several times more TVL (the amount of funds locked in the blockchain). Solana has a more advanced consensus algorithm that provides faster network speeds. Stability, decentralization, and almost complete trust from the community, investors, and developers.

What is the real world use of Solana? ›

The most notable use case is Decentralized Finance (DeFi), with real-world examples being decentralised applications (dApps) and decentralised exchange platforms like Metamask, Uniswap, Cryptokitties, SocialX, etc., and NFTs as you can find on platforms like OpenSea.

Does Solana make money? ›

The current estimated reward rate of Solana is 5.92%. This means that, on average, stakers of Solana are earning about 5.92% if they hold an asset for 365 days. 24 hours ago the reward rate for Solana was 5.93%. 30 days ago, the reward rate for Solana was 6.09%.

How much will 1 Solana be worth in 2030? ›

Solana (SOL) Price Prediction 2030
YearPrice
2025$ 147.54
2026$ 154.91
2027$ 162.66
2030$ 188.30
1 more row

What coding language is used for Solana? ›

Solana programs are typically written in the Rust language, but C/C++ are also supported. There are also various community driven efforts to enable writing on-chain programs using other languages, including: Python via Seahorse (that acts as a wrapper the Rust based Anchor framework)

Is Solana a coin or blockchain? ›

Solana is a blockchain platform designed to host decentralized, scalable applications.

Did Solana make millionaires? ›

Solana (SOL -10.23%) has minted a lot of millionaires since its launch in 2020. The cryptocurrency started trading at $0.95 and hit its all-time high of $260.06 on Nov. 6, 2021 -- which would have turned a $10,000 investment into $2.74 million.

What celebrities are in Solana? ›

⭐️ Solana Celebrities

The latest tokens from public figures like Australian rapper Iggy Azalea, SoundCloud rapper Trippie Redd, and former Olympian Caitlyn Jenner have made a big splash across Crypto Twitter over the past week.

Did Solana partner with Google? ›

Now, Solana Labs has joined forces with Google Cloud. Through this partnership, the team behind the eco-friendly green blockchain will use the capabilities of Google Cloud to offer its own blockchain-based game development suit to developers.

How much is Solana founder worth? ›

As of 2023, Anatoly Yakovenko had a net worth of approximately $69 million. However, this has since multiplied, with his net worth now closer to $500 million. The precise total is unknown, however, most publications cite Yakovenko's net worth of around $460 million as of May 2024.

Who is the owner of Solana account? ›

By default, all new accounts are owned by the System Program. The System Program performs several key tasks such as: New Account Creation: Only the System Program can create new accounts. Space Allocation: Sets the byte capacity for the data field of each account.

Who is Anatoly Yakovenko founder and CEO of Solana? ›

Anatoly Yakovenko is the founder and CEO of one of the Ethereum killers, Solana blockchain. Similar to many of us and other blockchain founders, he made his way from working in a traditional industry to the blockchain industry.

Who are the backers of Solana? ›

Who are the investors in Solana? Solana has 91 institutional investors including a16z, Polychain and Multicoin Capital.

References

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