Bytom’s mainnet has been running stably for almost two years. In 2019 Bytom went through some difficulties but we insisted in our goals to tokenize assets and our mission to create diverse assets and a programmable economy.
Keep MOVing is not only the slogan of Bytom’s layer 2 value exchange protocol but also Bytom team’s belief. In the Bytom Global Devcon in San Francisco, we launched Bytom’s sidechain Vapor which adopts BBFT consensus algorithm. Later, we launched MOV, layer 2 value exchange protocol, aiming to build a decentralized DEFI ecosystem.
We also launched a BaaS platform Bystack because we believe that the future of blockchain lies in the model of public blockchain(mainchain) plus industry blockchain(sidechain).
The key words for Bytom in 2019 was Stable, Secure and Prosperous. We also set three goals for Bytom in 2020:
1. Productization: Commercialize Bytom’s technology and products in order to make profit.
2. Innovation: Improve open gateway protocol and design creative DEFI products and business models.
3. Leadership: Represent the positive development direction and keep leader position in blockchain industry. Explore more use cases.
On January 6th, Bytom CEO Yu Lang and CTO James Zhu conducted an 2-hour AMA on ChainNode and answered many questions from the community about Bytom’s 2020 development plan and its values.
Below is part of the Q&A in this AMA.
Q1: What’s the plan of Bytom in 2020? How does Bytom position itself? What are Bytom’s advantages over other public blockchains?
Yu Lang: Bytom will focus on the goals set by Bytom Foundation and expand Bytom’s survival space with compliance. MOV as well as a series of industry sidechains will be Bytom’s priority in 2020. Bytom always focuses on assets tokenization and bridging atomic assets and physical assets. Bytom is not simply a public blockchain but a platform supporting mainchain, sidechain and crosschain.
James：Development on MOV will come to an end soon and all the codes can be seen on Github. Now the testnet is running stably and the mainnet will be released at any time after the compliance issue being solved.
Q2： How will MOV contribute to DEFI？
James：Many financial models failed because of human beings but off-chain assets cannot avoid being dealt with by human beings. The circulating of assets on MOV replaces human beings with blockchains so that many models can run on MOV.
Q3：Ethereum has first mover advantage and advantage on market cap in terms of DEFI. How can Bytom compete with Ethereum?
Yu Lang: A large market cap comes from rich applications and abundant users, not the other way around. MOV is a comprehensive platform which supports crosschain to all other blockchains, not just a stable coin such as MakerDao. A stable coin will be launched on MOV, which will benefit Bytom since it enables Bytom to have more valuable assets. This stable coin will be based on an algorithm of a basket of cryptocurrencies including BTM.
Q4: How to use DEFI products on MOV? Why do users not use Ethereum DEFI products？
Yu Lang: 1. There are incentives for using MOV. Ethereum does not have that. 2. DEFI is more efficient and faster on MOV. 3. Bytom will provide better user experience.
Q5：Why Bytom wants to achieve cross-chain technology in 2020? What’s the difference with Cosmos or Polkadot?
James：It is a healthy development model that demands drive technology development. It’s not proper that we create a technology just because it’s cool but has no demands. The reason why Bytom started to do crosschain technology in 2019 is that many assets on other blockchains needed to be moved to Bytom in MOV ecosystem while current crosschain technology cannot meet the demand.
Yu Lang: Polkadot is a specific crosschain platform while crosschain is only a part of Bytom’s ecosystem. Other crosschain technology has not been applied yet. Bytom is in advance of them.
Q6: Is speculation of tokens the only value of public blockchains? Why do we not see any application?
Yu Lang: The value of a public blockhain does not derive from speculation of tokens. Bytom already has many use cases but most of them do not have tokens. We will insist on the right path and try our best to explore promising use cases.
Q7: Does Bytom only emphasize technology rather than application? What’s the value of Bystack to Bytom?
Yu Lang：Technology，compliance, application and ecosystem are all important backstones for Bytom. In 2020, Bytom team’s priority is promoting MOV ecosystem. In addition, to-B and to-G services aim at promoting Bystack which is comprised of one mainchain(Bytom Blockchain) and many sidechains. Bystack will benefit Bytom because Bystack is the right direction for exploring use cases. If either MOV or Bystack succeeds, Bytom will succeed.
Q8: Are there many projects developed on Bystack?
James：There are several projects developed on Bystack and the former three projects are relevant. 1. MOV magnet contract protocol 2.DEFI stablecoin ecosystem 3. OFMF open gateway protocol 4.Bystack cloud service platform
Q9: Apart from improving MOV protocol, why does Bytom team also emphasize the importance of BaaS platform Bystack in 2020?
Yu Lang: Bystack has many modules such us identity, contract, privacy, consensus, crosschain, transactions, which could be used in different application scenarios. For example, a data confirmation system can become applicable for a product traceability system after a certain module being changed. In addition, knowledge about blockchain infrastructure is not needed to change a module and only industry knowledge is needed, which lowers the threshold for blockchain product developers. In 2020, we expect Bytom to be used in more industries and businesses. Productization is Bytom’s goal in 2020.
Q10: Issuing tokens is banned in China. Are you planning to develop a blockchain without token?
Yu Lang: Being compliant means not to do illegal things. We need higher level self-principles in areas with lagging legal supervision.
