FAQ

Questions, answered.

Everything about Zilliqa’s updated direction: the Mediation Layer, compliance before settlement, the roadmap, and what it means for the community.

For Institutions & Professional Counterparties

Questions from regulated entities, asset managers, banks, and financial institutions evaluating Zilliqa as infrastructure.

What is Zilliqa’s updated direction?

Zilliqa is building the compliance infrastructure for institutional onchain finance. The updated roadmap focuses on a single problem: institutional blockchain finance has always settled first and checked compliance after. Zilliqa is built to run that check before a transaction settles, on any chain or settlement rail. Compliance is enforced before settlement, not reconciled after the fact.

What is the Mediation Layer?

The Mediation Layer is Zilliqa’s core product. It sits above settlement and runs a credential check before a transaction clears, confirming both parties hold the required identity and meet the applicable policy conditions. If both pass, the transaction proceeds. If they don’t, it doesn’t. The check runs first. Everything else follows.

The Mediation Layer is designed to be settlement-agnostic: it works across chains and settlement rails, not tied to a single substrate.

What does ‘compliance before settlement’ mean in practice?

In current institutional blockchain workflows, a transaction settles first. Compliance is verified afterwards, through post-trade reconciliation, exception management, or remediation workflows. Every one of those processes exists because the infrastructure runs in the wrong order.

Zilliqa inverts that sequence. The credential check runs first. Institutions can confirm that the counterparty is who they say they are, that both parties are permitted to transact, and that the transaction meets applicable policy, before anything settles. No post-settlement remediation required.

Which chains and settlement rails does the Mediation Layer support?

The Mediation Layer is built to be settlement-agnostic, not tied to a single chain or settlement infrastructure. The aim is to let institutions meet compliance requirements regardless of which network their counterparty settles on. Cross-chain capability is a defined milestone in Phase 03 of the roadmap.

What credential standards does Zilliqa use?

The Mediation Layer is designed around verifiable identity credentials that bind a wallet to a verified legal entity: vLEI (Verifiable Legal Entity Identifier), a GLEIF framework standard. This lets institutions confirm who they are transacting with before anything settles, with legal-grade certainty.

Zilliqa works with LTIN (Liechtenstein Trust Integrity Network), majority-owned by Telecom Liechtenstein, a 100% state-owned critical infrastructure provider, as the credentialing authority that issues vLEI credentials for the network.

Is Zilliqa a permissioned chain?

No. Zilliqa is a public blockchain. The Mediation Layer adds a credential check before settlement; it does not make the chain permissioned. Transactions that pass credential verification proceed on the public network today. The compliance layer is additive, not restrictive.

What is the current status of development?

Three priority initiatives are in active development:

  • vLEI Issuer, operated by LTIN. Verifiable, tamper-proof identity for legal entities, binding organisations to the wallets and signers acting for them.
  • Mediation Layer, provided by Zilliqa. The neutral layer that checks identity and policy before a transaction settles.
  • Settlement Network, joint. LTIN’s sovereign infrastructure and Zilliqa’s validators in one execution layer, designed for resilient settlement of regulated flows.

None of these initiatives is live or deployed. Phase 01 targets credential infrastructure and the Mediation Layer architecture specification. The full roadmap is published at zilliqa.com/roadmap.

What data will be published, and when?

One rule governs every milestone: no claim without something shipped behind it. Each phase publishes evidence rather than projections:

  • Phase 01: Mediation Layer architecture specification. First public report on ZIL economics.
  • Phase 02: Transaction data from live regulated flows, volume, latency, and revenue. The first hard evidence the architecture works at scale.
  • Phase 03: Cross-chain and cross-jurisdiction transaction data.
  • Phase 04: Audited revenue figures, the point at which revenue exceeds subsidy, published.
Who can build on the Mediation Layer?

The Mediation Layer is designed as open infrastructure. Documentation and the architecture specification will be published. For institutional enquiries or integration discussions prior to that, contact enquiry@zilliqa.com.

For ZIL Holders & Developers

Questions from the existing Zilliqa community, ZIL holders, and developers building on the network.

Is Zilliqa still a public chain?

Zilliqa is a public blockchain. The updated roadmap adds compliance infrastructure for institutional finance on top of that foundation. Today, the network is open, the token is accessible, and developers can build on the chain as they do now.

What does this direction mean for ZIL?

ZIL is the native token of the Zilliqa network. Phase 01 includes the first public report on ZIL economics, setting the baseline for token utility in the updated architecture. Phase 04 targets the point at which network revenue exceeds subsidy, audited and published. Token economics will be reported at each phase milestone rather than projected in advance.

What changes for developers building on Zilliqa?

The Mediation Layer is additive; it does not change how the existing chain operates today. Applications can build on the compliance layer without every application needing to be compliance-enabled. The architecture specification and documentation will be published as part of Phase 01.

What are the four roadmap phases and when do they happen?

The roadmap runs from Q2 2026 through Q2 2027. Each phase opens a new institutional capability:

  • Phase 01 · Credential Infrastructure Live (Q2 2026): Settlement network goes live. Mediation Layer architecture specification published. First public ZIL economics report.
  • Phase 02 · First Live Regulated Flows (Q3 2026): Real transactions run through the Mediation Layer in production. Volume, latency, and revenue data published.
  • Phase 03 · Cross-Chain and Cross-Jurisdiction (Q4 2026): Credential-verified settlement beyond a single chain and jurisdiction.
  • Phase 04 · The Model Proven (Q2 2027): Revenue exceeds subsidy, audited and published.
What does ‘no claim without something shipped’ mean?

Every milestone on the roadmap is tied to something verifiable: published data, deployed code, or financials. The roadmap names the direction; each phase publishes the evidence. We won’t describe a milestone as reached until the evidence is published.

How can I follow progress?

Roadmap milestones are published at zilliqa.com/roadmap as they are reached. Community updates go to Discord and Telegram. Developer documentation is at dev.zilliqa.com. Institutional enquiries: enquiry@zilliqa.com.