Blockchain company enters ‘token economy’ with STokens

Blockchain-based payments and business development company X-widget said it is entering a “token economy” business where tokens are paid to users when they spend money.

Through a blockchain-based discount coupon system that allows users to collect 10 percent of their purchases and give them a 10 percent discount, X-widget hopes to attract 100 million users worldwide, including 10 million in South Korea, by 2024.

X-widget said its blockchain-based mileage project called SToken, designed to help self-employed and small business owners, attracted more than 800,000 users with over 1,000 stores signing up for the service in Korea and Vietnam.

The company said it plans to attract more stores and users in Southeast Asia and expand to other parts of Asia.

To that end, X-widget has developed Web 3.0 global platform S members, completing a business structure that rewards stakeholders including suppliers, customers and platform operator based on their participation level.

Based on X-widget’s own blockchain network, or a mainnet called MASnet, the S-Members platform is exclusively embedded in a mobile cold wallet called “Master Bank” which acts as the portal to the platform. It also has a customer service evaluation system, a messenger service and a blockchain reservation system to prevent no-shows.

SToken is a system for getting discounts from S-Member’s stores. On SToken, the currency setting changes automatically depending on the user’s location and language choice. The SToken service is currently available in Korean, English and Vietnamese. By the end of this year, users will be able to record photos of the stores, “follow” stores, post reviews and use alert features for hot sales, the company said.

Member stores can enter information about their products, services and discount rates on a real-time basis using the S-Members app for businesses. They should receive or collect up to 10 percent of payments made in STokens. Users can get discounts or collect points by browsing information from stores near their location. A “hot sale alarm system”, developed to help stores get rid of their goods, sends out messages through the app to users within a 10 kilometer radius.

Kimg Seong-un, CEO of X-widget, said that it is a system where the company’s Master Bank mobile cold wallet and non-fungible token platform have a synergistic effect through SToken users and stores.

“Starting from Korea and Southeast Asian countries such as Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Indonesia and the Philippines, we plan to globalize S members and aim to grow into a ‘decacorn’ project,” said Kim, referring to a super unicorn startup valued at over $10 billion.

X-widget said that when STokens come to have money exchange value as S members expand and use of STokens increases, the company will sell all its STokens on the crypto asset exchange and donate the proceeds to non-governmental organizations. The record of where the donations from each donor went can be stored on the blockchain and opened in a transparent way.

X-widget said the ultimate goal of S-Members is to “Save the Earth” through a Web 3.0 blockchain-based win-win project for consumers and member stores. It plans to partner with a Korean shipbuilder and a global environmental NGO for a “Blockchain NGO Plastic Island” donation project, where special ships collect plastic waste at the mouth of rivers before it flows into the ocean, and cutting-edge technology is used to turn the plastic waste into petroleum.

Money collected from the sale of the petroleum products and donations will be used to build several small vessels to be placed at the estuaries, and larger ships will also be built to collect pollutants from 10 landfill islands in the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans, according to the company .

X-widget is also a group of homegrown blockchain experts who offer consulting services and solutions optimized for enterprise environments.

“The Stoken project can lock in platform participants by issuing as incentives tokens that can be exchanged for tangible or intangible values,” Kim said.

“By lowering the threshold for businesses to use blockchain networks, X-widget will greatly support small business owners around the world, building an ecosystem where digital assets are used in the real world and contribute to society.”

By Kim So-hyun ([email protected])