NEO and Celer Network have announced a partnership that aims to “improve [the] scalability and usability of [the] NEO dApp ecosystem for mass adoption.” Celer Network is a second layer solution that sits between the blockchain layer and dApp layer in a tech stack. Its platform aims to “[enable] fast, easy and secure off-chain transactions for not only payment transactions, but also generalized off-chain smart contract[s].”

According to the announcement, the NEO Foundation has committed to staking CELR tokens and seeks to become “one of the major nodes on the Celer Network.” Nodes on the Celer Network are responsible for securing off-chain state channels.

Additionally, NEO and Celer Network aim to “collaborate on marketing and community building in China and across the globe.”

Two-phase integration

The integration with Celer Network’s second layer solution will take place in two phases.

First, NEO engineers will write Celer’s generalized state channel smart contract in C#, “which can run on the NEO smart contract VM smoothly.” Afterward, the open-source code will merge with Celer’s cChannel smart contract repository. Phase one is expected to conclude in Q4 2019.

In phase two, engineers from both parties will “connect Celer’s layer-two system components to the Celer Network’s generalized state channel smart contracts on NEO.” Through these processes, the NEO and Celer Network aim to establish a “Unified State Channel Standard.” Phase two is expected to be complete in Q1 2020.

The full announcement can be found at the link below:
https://medium.com/celer-network/celer-neo-508de9e3ead7