Top 10 Most Asked Topics During the VeChain AMA Marathon

VeChain successfully held an 8 hour long AMA Marathon on June 30th, where VeChainWorld Forum collected 534 questions in total. Around 67,000 people watched the live broadcast.

The following are expanded answers to the top 10 most asked topics from Sunny’s 8-hour AMA Marathon live broadcast, based on the questions collected on the VeChainWorld forum.

1. Economic Model

a) What is the relationship between VET/VTHO and actual use cases？

In real-life use cases, companies choose to use the VeChainThor Blockchain to facilitate transactions that the company can not perform without using the VeChainThor Blockchain, thus creating valuable transactions, and these transactions on the mainnet would all consume VTHO as according to the economic model. As the number of companies using the blockchain continues to increase and the business scale continues to expand, clearly, this means that the VeChainThor Blockchain and its surrounding services are assisting said companies and clients in creating more economic value, causing the demand for VTHO to inevitably grow every day, which will thus be reflected by the price of VTHO. And since VTHO is generated by VET, the price growth of VTHO will be reflected by the price of VET.

In Whitepaper V1.0, it is stated that the Price of VTHO shall be stable, which was not clear enough and caused some misunderstandings in the community.

What we really meant is that we need to keep the cost of using blockchain relatively stable, aka the transaction cost in FIAT should fall within a range which is acceptable by both the Foundation and commercial entities, creating and using the blockchain for transactions. Despite concerns by some quarters of the community regarding the hike in the price of VTHO causing transaction costs to be relatively more expensive, the VeChain Foundation will always closely monitor and take various measures to ensure that the cost of using the Blockchain be kept affordable for all stakeholders including community developers and non-enterprise users.

b) Where do enterprises get the VTHO that they are consuming?

The enterprises need to pay when they adopt blockchain-based solutions, such as ToolChain. The cost and money invested by enterprises to use ToolChain will directly be used to purchase VTHO and VET on the open market. The cost of using the blockchain is directly related to the transaction volume on VeChainThor Mainnet.

2. Walmart China Partnership

Will you expand your cooperation and solutions to other supermarkets after the success with Walmart China, and is it possible that you will duplicate this model to other industries and companies?

We are grateful to PwC for the successful collaboration and cooperation with Walmart China, as well as to DNV GL for the Italian Wine Association collaboration. In fact, they have been helping us all along to explore the market together as VeChain’s strategic partners and for that, we, in turn, provide them with technical support, tools, and services, so that they can easily develop new VeChainThor-powered applications for different enterprises across multiple industries and use cases.

The successful cooperation between VeChain and Walmart China, first and foremost, indicates that traditional companies are willing to use Public Blockchains. Secondly, Blockchains in the future will most likely be a mixture of Public Blockchain and Private Blockchain, depending on the use case. Thirdly, by partnering with PwC to empower Walmart China’s Food Safety Traceability Platform, we have not only provided this solution to Walmart China consumers but also established contacts with Walmart China’s suppliers. In the future, we may gradually convince these companies to apply blockchain, thus putting into reality what we have been talking about — “applying blockchain technology across the board”.

3. X-Node

a) Why Were X-Nodes made tradable?

The idea of trading X-Nodes was first put forward by early community members who held X-Nodes and expressed the hope of transferring VET to other wallets. Without node trading function, they would lose nodes after transferring VET. Besides, with such a function, we can provide a free trading platform for the community members who are optimistic about the future of the VeChain project. Apart from that, ever since the Mainnet launch and X-Node binding service started, we found out that some X-Node holders were trading X-Nodes in private through risky OTC methods, which would pose a potential threat to the assets of both the buyers and the sellers. Thus, after observation and careful consideration and discussions internally, we decided to tokenize X-Nodes as Non-Fungible Tokens and thus enabling a safe way for trading X-Nodes. Now that we are in the midst of preparing and eventually launching a better voting mechanism for the governance of the Blockchain, we will listen to the voice of the community more when making decisions like this. In the future, we will provide more benefits for X-Node holders, or even allow these holders to participate in the governance of the community.

b) For X-Node holders, is it possible to set an incremental system where the longer you hold your VET, the more VTHO you will be rewarded?

Good question! Actually, it is pretty much like Coin Age in Proof-of-Stake. We have given much thought to that question, but still, we need to do our research, for example, on how to achieve it from a technical perspective in our Blockchain architecture. Even if we can make it happen, we still need the community to vote before deciding whether we should actually do this.

c) Will X-Node holders have more benefits in the future?

We would like to first thank X-Node holders for their consistent support for VeChain. They are like family members to us. The entire VeChain ecosystem is willing to provide benefits to the X-Node holders. Therefore, with more projects onboard, X-Node holders will get more benefits. For example, through activities like this AMA, projects such as Plair, 8Hours-PlayTable, and OceanEx also joined us in providing rewards to X-Node holders to express our gratitude. In the future, the X-Node holders will be rewarded with more benefits, and they’ll have a larger role to play in community governance.

4. Technical Development Plan

a) What upgrades will the VeChainThor Wallet have?

The new version of VeChainThor Wallet will be released in July. After collecting feedback from the community, the new version will add price display function in fiat and more support for dApps.

b) What progress has VeChain made in cross-chain? What are your plans in this regard? Cross-chain technology is the future, and we have done a lot of work. At present, technical preparations have been completed, not only involving the exchange of information cross-chain, but also the exchange of value between Blockchains. In the next phase, VeChain will focus on the introduction of specific application scenarios and use cases. Please look forward to our future plans and announcements to come.

c) Is it possible to achieve untraceable TX? I mean not for the entire blockchain but can be an option for untraceable tx when users want.
For privacy-focused transactions, the Anonymous Protocol, ‘Bulletproofs’ as put forward by Professor Dan Boneh of Stanford University was designed to solve this problem. It will be part of the direction of our upcoming technological development, which we will mention in Whitepaper V2.0. This functionality will help both individual users and corporate customers alike.

5. Roadmap of VeChain

We have many plans for the future. Our overall plan for the future is that we will continue to develop valuable applications, e.g. carbon emissions reduction, or more broadly use cases related to sustainable development. These projects will enable different people in different time zones and countries to set aside their differences for a common goal, which is in line with the ultimate goal of Blockchain development and adoption. This is why we are willing to put more efforts to explore such projects.

a) What do you think of the present Blockchain industry?

The first trend in the market is that more professionals and industry giants are entering, including Facebook, JP Morgan, etc. The second is that the requirement for legality and compliance has become more urgent. Large-scale commercial application is drawing closer. For VeChain, Blockchain’s advancement relies on the joint adoption and cooperation in the industry, rather than the strength of a single player.

b) How is it going with the updates on the Whitepaper?

Whitepaper V2.0 is being prepared. All updated contents will be published after a vote and decision made at the VeChain Foundation Steering Committee.

c) Are there any ideas for a stable coin working on VeChainThor in the future?

We prefer to call it a settlement coin rather than a stable coin. Current stable coin issues include lack of trust/endorsement and lack of use cases (currently only popular as a means of Cryptocurrency trading). But, there are actually lots of financial applications, such as being used as collateral or for investment purposes. The key is the need for KYC, and that’s what VeVID is designed for. The team has been discussing a lot about this. Settlement coin will be the next big thing for VeChain. Please look forward to our future announcements.

6. With regards to USA Expansion, Regulation & Exchanges

VeChain Foundation is still a relatively young organization, and it is true we have been spending more of our attention and more resources in Asia and Europe, which we are proud of our achievements so far in these regions. We do have a smaller presence in the USA or North America in general and we are trying to improve on our position in the market and industry. We have now hired Jason Rockwood to spearhead our business development efforts, and we do have plans in place to pivot more resources into North America, both on the business development front and also partnerships within the Blockchain and Cryptocurrency industries. VeChain acknowledges that the regulations in the United States are indeed stricter than most other jurisdictions and we will move forward under the guidance of our legal counsel in the USA, Scott Brisbin, and our Steering Committee member Daniel Kelman, both of whom are extremely experienced veterans in their respective areas of expertise. To us, being sustainable long term is the number one priority, and that means first and foremost to focus and be compliant to the current and future set of regulations. Rest assured that VeChain believes in and is very committed to the USA market.

7. Exploring New Use Cases or DApps

VeChain has always believed that technology should bring new value to businesses, and the best carrier for such change is through enterprises. As enterprises already have their own business models, VeChain can take the role of an enabler, helping enterprises to better expand their businesses through VeChainThor Blockchain.

Traceability is one of the major use cases for VeChain, and yet it is also the first step for many other use cases. To start the application of Blockchain in the value chain of enterprises, you have to enable businesses and enterprises to upload and store relevant data on the Blockchain.

For instance, we initially provided BYD with a management solution for the whole life cycle for automobiles. Meanwhile, we offered traceability solutions in different supply-chain procedures for Bright Food’s “Cupids Farm”. When the first step is done, we discovered that they could be interconnected through our digital carbon ecosystem. BYD users can generate carbon credits, and then Bright Foods will pay for them, using real products and values to support sustainability.

The Digital Carbon Ecosystem is a multi-party collaborative platform, which provides a new option for enterprises to practice social responsibilities. Through Carbon Credits, companies will be able to showcase how much they have contributed to the cause of environmental protection. For that reason, UNDP has signed with us to support the Digital Carbon Ecosystem. Thus, in the long run, VeChain will continue to support community applications and also develop enterprise-focused applications with real value on the VeChainThor blockchain.

8. Regarding VeChain Community Development

VeChain attaches great importance to the development of the community, and has always been listening to the community. It’s a good idea to establish a community alliance, and we hope that community members can actively participate in the organization of such groups and promote the Blockchain-based commercial applications developed by VeChain, thus adding momentum to the development of VeChain Ecosystem. Such actions will be supported by the Foundation. Plans in detail shall be disclosed in the future.

When will the next election of the VeChain Foundation Steering Committee take place? Is it possible that community representatives join the Governance Committee or Functional Committee?

These questions will be answered in Whitepaper V2.0. According to our existing arrangement, the members of the Steering Committee will serve a 2-year term, from ICO to the launch of mainnet, which is a trial run period. The current term started on June 30, 2018, and will end on June 30, 2020. That means a new Steering Committee will be elected before that date, together with a new architecture. And to be sure, community representatives will be able to participate.

9. Relationship between VeChain Foundation and the VeChain company

VeChain Foundation was established in mid-2017. Like many other projects, it is a non-profit organization dedicated to the development of the community and the core Blockchain infrastructure. However, the lack of relevant regulations makes it really hard to get things done. For example, when you pay your employees’ salaries, not everyone accepts being paid in digital currency. So you often need to pay in fiat.

In the meantime, you need a team that is capable of getting things done to run the daily operations. That’s why we established the VeChain company in Shanghai. Like many start-ups, the company provides many tools and services, and its primary job is to help VeChain Foundation with the day-to-day operations. If some toolset or other materials critical to the VeChain community are unbuilt due to financial constraints, lack of existing products or other limitations then the VeChain company will step up on behalf of the community and will build such toolsets and materials. Take the VeChainThor Mobile Wallet for example. A few years ago, many people were developing desktop wallets and few people would develop mobile wallets. However, many of our Chinese community members had established a habit of using mobile wallets. That’s where we jumped in. (Same thing about HSM). We had some great ideas that were meaningful, but there was a lack of development within the community that would put them into reality. So, the VeChain company got the job done to enable more people to develop more valuable applications on the mainnet of VeChainThor Blockchain.

10. How is the USD-500-million ThorPower Fund going?

The USD-500-million ThorPower fund is under smooth progress. We are targeting the main source of capital contribution to be comprised of family offices, investment funds, and other limited partners that seek long-term sustainable gains, and at the same time believe that we are making a long term difference in the world.

We will engage and enlist investment professionals and/or qualified investment institutions to help manage these funds. In the meantime, we have engaged distinguished VCs and incubators to help us with identifying our future potential investment targets whom we will be bringing onboard the VeChain Ecosystem. We’ll work closely with many well-known VC and incubators such as Fenbushi Capital, Draper Dragon, LongHash, Tribe Venture, and other distinguished organizations to provide support for the projects within the ecosystem. The portfolio in their system who have interests in joining VeChain Ecosystem are also our targets. In addition, we welcome the participation of traditional Internet companies who are willing to use blockchain or find the blockchain technology useful for their businesses. It will definitely be a win-win.