Global blockchain NEAR wants to bet big on India, and is switching to Web3
Despite global crypto markets turning bearish, India remains top priority for several international blockchain projects, networks and projects.
More global players are now turning to India as it has gained a reputation for being the next big hub for web developer talent and having a large consumer base.
Ethereum, Solana and BNB Chain have become a staple in the Indian Web3 space. These are known as Layer-1 blockchains – a base layer or network. Polygon – a Layer 2 solution – is also the market leader in India.
Now another is in the mix: NEAR — a promising Layer-1 project that uses sharding to solve the blockchain scalability problem.
With an eye on India, NEAR is actively incubating startups to help boost blockchain talent development and innovation.
The goal is to bring 5 million monthly active users (MAU) on NEAR from India by the end of the year.
With this, it joins Ethereum, Polygon and the other prominent blockchain ecosystems in tapping into India’s tech and developer talent.
For NEAR India, the idea is to bring mainstream adoption of Web3 apps and networks, through collaboration and close collaboration with Web2 brands and startups.
While the original plan was to set up a physical incubator, bear market conditions led NEAR’s India team to run a virtual incubator while retaining a smaller office space in Bengaluru for physical meetings and pitches.
“We launched in September 2022, bringing NEAR’s technology, infrastructure and DApp ecosystem to a wide range of startups and developers,” said Yash Kanchan, Director, NEAR India.
“We started talking to NEAR and its non-profit arm NEAR Foundation to build a regional hub in India, relying on them for support in terms of development, funding… So far we have already worked on 11 promising start-up projects that are all set to go live soon.”
Mass adoption of Web3
NEAR India not only helps startups incubate their Web3 projects from idea stage to minimum viable product MVP, but also onboard non-Web3 brands.
With NEAR, the well-being platform Growfitter is running a fitness challenge to bring over 1 lakh users to Web3. The platform claims to have over 5 lakh active users, and seeks to transfer some parts of user activity to Web3 as user wallets.
The onboarding wallet service for Growfitter is provided by Jumpanother platform being incubated at NEAR India.
Through this service, it provides simplified wallet dashboard services to the NEAR ecosystem, allowing anyone to connect to the wallet and manage portfolios.
“The projects we select are backed by strong investors, and can navigate the bear markets, as their fundamentals are strong. Despite the unfavorable conditions, many brands we reach out to today are open to having detailed conversations about including blockchain in their technology stacks theirs, says Aayush Gupta, Director, NEAR India.
How NEAR works
As a Layer-1 blockchain, NEAR uses sharding technology to achieve scale, and has cross-chain interoperability through its The Rainbow Bridge and Layer-2 product Aurora. Aurora allows developers to serve their apps on an Ethereum-compatible platform.
Yash and Kanchan vouch for the network’s strength in wallet, bridge and sharding infrastructure to safely onboard and host millions of users.
If mass adoption and enterprise use cases of Web3 were to become a reality, there would be a need for chains that can handle high transaction volumes without compromising security or decentralization.
Sharding is a possible solution to existing limitations around the scaling of blockchains.
Simply put, the process involves grouping blockchain network participants (nodes) into subsets (shards), ensuring that transactions are only carried out by a specific shard, rather than the entire network. This in turn reduces the transaction burden on the larger chain.
As such, with sharding, the entire chain does not need to reach consensus for the transaction in question. NEAR is one of the early adopters of this technology, having been founded in 2020 by Alex Skidanov and Illia Polosukhin.
It uses the Proof of Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism to secure its network, providing an ecosystem for developers to build and deploy their decentralized applications or DApps.
“We are coming up with a way to enable apps to be deployed on NEAR using JavaScript – which is a more common language than the Web3 languages Solidity and Rust. This will enable a large mass of developers to build on on NEAR,” Yash added.
Despite being discrete from Ethereum – the most dominant DApp ecosystem in terms of value, number of developers, projects and mindshare – NEAR’s Aurora chain is compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), enabling interoperability and transfer of value between Ethereum-based and other EVM chains.
NEAR’s India team also focuses on strengthening brand relationships with users through Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) that are constantly increasing in value and are not subject to volatile market conditions.
For example, an NFT that proves a user’s membership or subscription to a brand will only accumulate value over time.
NEAR India is confident that all these features put together will create a strong use case for Web2 brands and startups to come onboard and deploy on the NEAR protocol.
“At the moment, Ethereum is the most dominant ecosystem. Over time, we can get more monthly users as we bring more brands. As we get users, our strong fundamentals will come into the spotlight and become more visible to the masses,” explains Aayush.
A large market for Web3
Currently, NEAR India is working on taking its cohort of 11 startups live with its Web3 games.
Besides Growfitter and Leap, the team works closely with Bit verse – a fantasy gaming app, Electron Labs – a blockchain solution with zero knowledge (ZK), Binocs – a crypto tax and compliance platform, Stader Labs – a liquid input network, Router protocol – a cross chain bridge and more.
With its active push into India’s startup ecosystem, NEAR is looking to build a strong community of users and developers – one that can compete with market leaders Ethereum, Polygon or Solana.
The entry into India signals a strong interest in leveraging the domestic technology ecosystem.
In fact, a recent NASSCOM report found that 90% of digital enterprises expect to increase investment across blockchain, artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML), the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial reality or virtual reality (AR/VR), and other new technologies.
NASSCOM’s report released amid the crypto downturn revealed that 11% of global Web3 talent is from India, and there has been a 138% increase in blockchain and cryptocurrency-related jobs since 2018.
NEAR’s efforts in India are based on several such factors. It develops and invests in NEAR India work to identify high-quality Web2 and Web3 startups.
“This hub gives us the chance to nurture the local talent that will have global opportunities in the near future. We look forward to seeing amazing applications and initiatives come out of this ecosystem,” said Marieke Flament, CEO, NEAR Foundation at the time of the launch of this regional hub.