Jihan Wu: ASICs make Ethereum mining more decentralized

Jihan Wu, co-founder of crypto mining giant Bitmain believes that ASIC miners will make blockchain networks like Ethereum more decentralized. Speaking at a keynote during a blockchain event in Chongqing, China, on Wednesday, Wu to cast doubts on Ethereum’s ProgPow upgrade. The ProgPOW or Progressive Proof-of-Work upgrade will give more emphasis to GPU mining than ASIC mining. Wu said:

“While we have seen various network upgrades that aim to become ASIC-resistant, such as Cuckoo cycle and ProgPow, but what we can foresee is that, very likely, there will still be ASIC miners for these two algorithms.”

Wu also alleged, without providing any concrete evidence, that certain individuals involved in the ProgPow proposal directly report to the CEO of NVIDIA:

“To me, ProgPow is clearly an effort to achieve centralization, in an attempt to exclude other integrated circuit designers to participate in ethereum mining. And GPU hardware is strongly protected by patents, so having a tailor-made algorithm for this type of hardware is certainly a way to avoid a fully competitive market.”

Wu concluded by arguing that ASIC miners are more capable of making a blockchain network safe than GPU hardware:

“But GPU-based mining algorithms are not specialized, they are compatible with each other. If miners attack one cryptocurrency, there are still others that can be mined. That’s why there are more 51-percent attacks on GPU-based cryptos.”