Input Output HK (IOHK), the company behind Cardano, finally revealed the launch date for smart contracts on the network. The announcement was made through a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnV4eWw37Ts" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">video update</a>, where Nigel Hemsley, Cardano’s head of delivery, said the feature would be released on September 12. IOHK’s marketing and communications director Tim Harrison also confirmed this date.

[embed]https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1426178532527558659[/embed]
<h2>Cardano Eyes September for Smart Contracts Launch</h2>
After much speculation, Cardano has finally set a date for launching smart contracts. This feature will help Cardano challenge Ethereum’s capabilities and draw more developers to its ecosystem. 

Speaking on the progress of smart contracts, Hemsley emphasized that the project’s engineering and testing teams are working “extremely hard” to polish everything before the mainnet launch. He added that Cardano would have almost 500 community members working on the network by the end of Alonzo’s purple phase. 

To implement the hard fork successfully, Cardano <a href="https://www.cryptoknowmics.com/news/cardano-nears-smart-contracts-with-alonzo-purple-launch/">needs</a> the cooperation of several exchanges. The Cardano foundation ensures that this working relationship is maintained and testnet features are experimented with on partner exchanges. 

The Cardano testnet will be hard forked on September 1, which will enable the developers to see how "the whole package" performs in a production environment. Hemsley said that this will be the final stage before Alonzo is fully deployed on the mainnet. He noted:

“As we come up toward this hard fork, we will deliver the Plutus capability, a full toolbox of smart contract capability, and then we’ll start it right from there. It gives us the foundation to build on Cardano…We'll have more and more dApps and other innovations coming out shortly afterward.”
<h2>ADA Jumps Another 16% After IOHK Announcement</h2>
Following IOHK’s announcement, Cardano’s native token ADA saw a<a href="https://www.cryptoknowmics.com/news/cardano-ada-skyrockets-ahead-of-smart-contract-upgrade/"> sharp uptick</a> in prices. The currency jumped almost 16% on Friday and reached its two-month high of $2.03. Shortly after that it briefly slipped to $2, which is 17% lower than its all-time peak of $2.39 in May.

As of press time, ADA has rebounded a little and is changing hands at $2.13, with a market cap of $68.8 billion.

Cardano Network Finally Unveils Launch Date for Smart Contracts

Input Output HK (IOHK), the company behind Cardano, finally revealed the launch date of smart contracts on the network on Friday.

Divya is a postgraduate from Jawaharlal Nehru University specializing in International Relations and a professional writer with more than 5 years of experience writing for the web. She is an avid reader interested in the global financial system and the effects of decentralization. At Cryptoknowmics, she hopes to deliver clear and understandable content to inform readers about the latest events in the crypto sector.

Cardano Network Finally Unveils Launch Date for Smart Contracts

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