NewsFirstLine spoke with TomoChain’s CEO Long Vuong to get a glimpse into how the Singapore-based blockchain tech firm has fared this year against the backdrop of the pandemic, and what its plans are for the upcoming year.
Qn: This year, the world has to deal with the ongoing rampage of the COVID-19 pandemic. Was there an impact on TomoChain?
2020 has definitely been a challenging year for the whole world. However, TomoChain has been very fortunate to be experiencing fewer impacts compared to the traditional economic fields. Our team has been adapting pretty well to the situation & coming up with alternatives. We focus more on extending on-chain productions and services and hosting online events where everyone can get access via their phone/laptop screen. Thus, the compulsory “work-from-home” period did not interfere with our productivity.
Qn: TomoChain has achieved several business expansions in 2020. Which of the new businesses is producing the most satisfactory results?
Like I mentioned above, the pandemic of 2020 did not stop TomoChain from completing our goals this year.
A few highlights in our ecosystem includes:
- Our partnership with Vietnam’s Ministry of Education & Training to secure millions of diplomas on our-chain, extending blockchain real-life use cases to the education sector.
- LuaSwap protocol, the multi-chain liquidity protocol on Ethereum for emerging token projects with no seed investment, founder’s fees, or pre-mining, with income generated from liquidity, LUA staking & LP fees.
- TomoChain acquired Lition, developer of a public-private blockchain known for its deletable data features, including its core blockchain business, technology, human resources, treasury, and digital properties.
- Apart from the big events, we also focus on maintaining and upgrading our public chain infrastructures and products, including TomoP Public Testnet, TomoX Mainnet, TomoDEX, TomoBridge.
Qn: TomoChain has emphasized DeFi this year. How do you differentiate TomoChain’s DeFi product from other DeFi projects? What do you expect to be the next trend after DeFi?
TomoChain’s significantly more robust infrastructure is what differentiates TomoChain’s DeFi from other projects. Unlike Ethereum, TomoChain offers users a faster and low-fee experience with 2000 TPS, 2-second block time, ~$0 gas fees. I believe that DeFi is just in its starting phase as a significant trend of the Financial Internet. It will continue to evolve even stronger in the next 3 to 5 years. In subsequent decades, wealthiness will be digitalized and be associated with crypto. Thus, we are humble to stay on course and build TomoChain towards the development of the Financial Internet.
Qn: NFTs are also believed to be a trend that can overtake DeFi. Does TomoChain have any intention to adopt this hype?
Indeed, NFTs can be considered a cousin of DeFi, both having received the same attention in the crypto space. Why can NFT be listed under the same DeFi trend, you wonder? Because a major attraction of NFT is its ability to be easily collected, exchanged, traded, bought, and sold on-chain.
Regarding NFTs on TomoChain’s ecosystem, our partner, Pantograph launched Panto NFT – in which users will be able to digitize their tickets, collectibles, passes, and so much more to the NFT (Non-fungible Token) format, which lasts forever on TomoChain.
One of TomoChain’s subsidiaries – SotaNext – a leading software development company in Vietnam is also working on NFT-focused products. TomoChain’s just achieved the 1st mass-market case for the use of NFTs with hundreds of thousands of NFT transactions over the last month. I cannot reveal more at the moment due to our NDA. Stay tuned in and look for our updates in the future.
Qn: Vietnamese Ministry of Education & Training has recently partnered with TomoChain to secure diplomas and certificates using blockchain technology. What are your upcoming plans to facilitate the use of blockchain solutions in Vietnam?
The partnership between TomoChain and Vietnam’s Ministry of Education & Training this year was definitely one of our biggest achieved milestones. Blockchain can now be used in real-life cases, specifically by securing millions of diplomas on our chain, making the process of storing and accessing documents more advanced & convenient. In the near future, to expand the use of blockchain solutions in not only Vietnam but also around the world, we will:
- Focus on the financial factor to bridge the gap between DEFI and the traditional market
- Expand the use cases of securing not only diplomas and certificates but also many more assets in different fields.
Qn: In your opinion, do Southeast Asian countries, in general, and Vietnam, in particular, need to develop their own CBDCs and what effects will CBDCs leave on these countries’ financial system?
From my perspective, every country with its own fiat will eventually have its own CBDC, as the CBDC system has been recently widely recognized. Some of CBDCs advantages include lower transaction costs, improved access to digital payments for unbanked households, independence from intermediaries, easily managed and more effective monetary policies,… and so on. CBDC will enhance the efficiency of a country’s payments system.
Qn: What are the goals of TomoChain for 2021?
As 2021 is approaching soon, our team is working on drawing new goals. This coming year, we will focus on expanding our product ecosystem and broadening DeFi use cases with stable coins and future trading features, for example:
2021 will see the mainnet launch of TomoP – The Privacy Suite. TomoP will be the first-ever EVM-compatible private transaction protocol allowing for the fastest private sends in under 4 seconds without requiring an intermediary. With TomoP, users can create anonymous transactions that hide the transaction value, sender, and receiver to preserve the financial privacy of holders of TOMO and tokens on TomoChain.
One of TomoChain’s own products, LuaSwap launched on Ethereum in October 2020 and will soon launch on TomoChain with the added benefits of instant swaps and near-zero fees
So yes, many plans to work hard on and look forward to.
Qn: Where do you foresee TomoChain one year and three years from now?
A couple of years may not sound like a lot, but it can create major changes. With our current working progress, I believe in TomoChain’s bright future. In the near future, TomoChain plans to become a credible alternative to Ethereum with solutions that solve all of Ethereum’s inconvenience on speed & cost. Moreover, building a sustainable ecosystem is in the plan as we onboard more developers and projects in the blockchain ecosystem and other fields like entertainment, education, and traditional finance.
