Hyperledger Sawtooth, like the rest of the Hyperledger family, is built for permissioned (private) networks rather than public networks, such as Ethereum, Bitcoin, and so on. As an enterprise-oriented blockchain system, it is designed around allowing different companies to coordinate using a blockchain and smart contracts. Originally developed by Intel, Sawtooth uses a unique consensus algorithm called Proof of Elapsed Time, or PoET.

PoET uses a lottery-based system for leader election. Using special Intel technology called the Trusted Execution Environment (TEE), along with Software Guard Extensions (SGX), available on some Intel chipsets, the leader is elected by each node generating a random wait time, with the shortest wait time going first. Because the code to generate the wait time is in the TEE, it can be verified that each node is running appropriate code and not skipping in line to become leader by not waiting the amount of time generated by the random time generator. Therefore, the election of the leader (and block issuer) is very fast, which in turn allows the blockchain to operate quickly.