OPEN - A Plug & Play Payment Solution for Application Developers

Cryptocurrencies and blockchain have become the main "buzzwords" in the tech industry in the recent months and years. However, any technology is only as good as how well it is adopted and implemented on the ground. Yes, popular Cryptocurrency exchanges are seeing huge daily trading volumes, even matching the likes of Global stock market powerhouse exchanges such as the NYSE. Yet, are we able to see a proportional rate in the adoption of cryptocurrencies as a payment option for Goods and Services? For instance, Are application developers using cryptocurrency payment methods inside their apps to sell their in-app purchases and subscriptions? I don't think so. There's clearly a lack of push here to drive the adoption of cryptocurrencies by developers as means of payment inside their apps.

According to Statista, the Mobile App Store revenues alone are expected to touch 75$ billion by 2020. A significant portion of this comes from In-App purchases and Subscriptions. So, clearly, there is a huge market opportunity for application developers and yet there are major roadblocks. Presently, there does not exist an easy solution for app developers to integrate blockchain & cryptocurrencies into their core infrastructure. This solution must include an application’s specific pricing scheme, accept & process cryptocurrencies in the same manner that FIAT transactions work, shall be able to track, verify and authorize all the purchases and the user's scheme, shall be able to sync the updates to the application layer and database through a developer-friendly API. To put things into perspective, Apple uses a combination of the App Store, iTunes Connect and the StoreKit framework/API to do all the above tasks for managing an in-app purchase or subscription and hence, Developers find it relatively easier to incorporate this to monetize their apps. But the traditional centralized app stores costs the developer upwards of 30% in fees. So there is an increasing necessity to build a blockchain based protocol-cum-platform that will offer the benefits of decentralization, eliminate intermediaries etc. The OPEN team through their OPEN platform is doing exactly that by offering an application payment infrastructure required for developers to use in their applications, both centralized and decentralized. With OPEN developers shall be able to accept, transfer payments, verify, authorize goods for their apps, on and off blockchains without familiarizing themselves with the complex architecture under the hood.

"The OPEN Platform is a blockchain based developer platform centered around providing payment infrastructure for mainstream application developers to embrace decentralized technologies."

_{OPEN platform architecture}

The core component of the OPEN ecosystem is the incorporation of smart contract based protocol known as Scaffold Protocol that will enable application developers to simply plug and play their payment scheme and accept payments from the users of their applications in whatever cryptocurrency they want.

Scaffold is essentially a template smart contract that is created by a developer and includes app-specific information, such as the pricing scheme and other relevant details. Developers can create and operate Scaffolds in the OPEN platform using OPEN tokens. To make a Scaffold active and to subsequently run it, developers need to "stake" OPEN tokens. A Scaffold requires a pricing scheme, in order to regulate and validate the transactions. Further, since Scaffold will also be responsible for the transfer of tokens into the developers' wallet it will need their wallet addresses.

Then we have the OPEN state which refers to the data that is stored by both the user and the database through InterPlanetary File System (IPFS). This data will be referenced by the Scaffold and used during verification.

Another key component is the OPEN API that acts a modular access point for developers to connect the on-chain interactions to the application database and perform tasks such as record and update payments, user data, user access. At its core, the OPEN API will use state-of-the-art technologies, languages, and libraries (web3.js and ETHJS) to access the blockchain core, yet the developers of the applications need not burden themselves with all this stuff. This level of abstraction will make the idea of a "Plug and Play Solution" a reality.

"Think of it is as the first developer wallet all applications require an accompanying API to enable any developer to use OPEN to port their application to any blockchain."

To top everything off, you have the ERC20 based OPEN tokens that will power the OPEN platform. In addition to being used by developers and consumers as a payment mechanism, the OPEN tokens serve other functions such as "staking" during the creation and operation of a Scaffold. The payment infrastructure and the OPEN tokens shall power Enterprise, Gaming and SaaS applications. The OPEN tokens have a total supply of 1,000,000,000. A portion of these was supposed to be offered through a crowd-sale, but owing to a rapid explosion in interest and oversubscription, the team had to do without it. However, 20% of the total tokens will be reserved for developers who express interest to build on the OPEN platform. Developer Growth Pool is crucial to the OPEN ecosystem as it is important to forge a good relationship with application developers and to drive adoption. If you are a developer who is fascinated with OPEN platform and what it has to offer, you may apply for the Developer Whitelist, provided you have an active Github account. You should also be able to explain how you intend to use the OPEN platform in your app.