BigchainDB
A decentralized storage system combining blockchain and database features
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About BigchainDB
BigchainDB is an open-source blockchain database that combines blockchain properties (decentralization, immutability, owner-controlled assets) with database properties (high transaction throughput, low latency, indexing and querying of structured data). Its core business is providing a scalable, queryable ledger for asset registration and transfer, supporting both divisible and indivisible assets with multi-signature conditions. The system uses Tendermint for Byzantine fault-tolerant (BFT) consensus, allowing up to one-third of nodes to fail arbitrarily while the network continues to operate. Each node maintains its own isolated MongoDB instance, so a compromise of one node's database does not affect others. This architecture enables node operators to expose full MongoDB query capabilities, including custom indexes, REST APIs, or GraphQL interfaces.
BigchainDB addresses the market pain point where traditional blockchains suffer from low throughput and poor queryability, while conventional databases lack decentralization and immutability. It serves use cases requiring tamper-proof audit trails, supply chain tracking, digital twins, identity management, and IP rights management. The system prevents double-spending, verifies cryptographic conditions on transfers, and ensures validated transactions are immutable.
Regarding development in the past six months (2026-03-12 to 2026-09-12), no reliable public information was found in the provided sources. The documentation and whitepaper describe version 2.2.2 and the 2.0 whitepaper, but no recent updates or news from this period were available. No significant negative events were identified in the available materials.
BigchainDB's development began in late 2014, with the concept of combining blockchain properties with distributed database scalability. In late summer 2015, the team selected RethinkDB as the underlying database, leveraging its changefeed mechanism for fault tolerance. The first public release, v0.1, was announced on February 10, 2016, as an open-source alpha version. On April 26, 2016, v0.2 improved cluster deployment and documentation. On May 3, 2016, v0.3 introduced richer transactions supporting the Interledger spec, including multisig and threshold conditions. The major milestone was BigchainDB 2.0, released in March 2018 as an alpha and finalized in June 2018. Version 2.0 made the system Byzantine fault tolerant (BFT), allowing up to one-third of nodes to be faulty or malicious. This version also established a migration path for future releases, marking a transition from prototype to production-ready software. These nodes represent the core technical evolution: from concept to alpha, to feature-rich transactions, and finally to BFT-based production readiness.
Bruce Pon: Co-founder and CEO of BigchainDB. Previously International Project Manager at Daimler Financial Services and Consultant at Accenture; founded Avantalion Consulting and digital art platform ascribe.io. Holds a bachelor's degree from University of Saskatchewan and studied at MIT Sloan.
Trent McConaghy: Co-founder and CTO of BigchainDB. AI and blockchain expert; previously founded ADA (acquired by Synopsys) and Solido (acquired by Siemens). Holds a PhD in EE from KU Leuven and bachelor's degrees from University of Saskatchewan; later co-founded Ocean Protocol.
Greg McMullen: Co-founder of BigchainDB, former Head of IP & Legal, and board member of IPDB Foundation.