Hi guys,
about a month ago I wrote a short FA of aergo for a community I work with. Then I decided to publish another one that I had ready, but I had done a good job of research and and I'm sorry to lock it in my computer and not let anyone read it.
I decided to share it here, it's been a long time since I opened Steemit, I come in and take a look after the recent controversy and check my wallet too.
Sorry for my English, which absolutely is not perfect.
Thank you all and I wish you a good reading
What is Aergo?
Aergo is an open source IT platform that allows businesses, programmers, and even government agencies to realize applications, software, and even complete ecosystems in a distributed architecture. Developers will be able to customize their blockchain and dApps both on permissioned and permissionless chains using Aergo. Customers can choose between a public or private chain or a solution that combines both.
Aergo platform is suitable for all businesses.
Hybrid blockchain
The project has its heart in the concept of hybrid blockchain: a system able to maintain the best feature of a private chain and a public chain within the same architecture and the same code. The idea is to combine control and sharing, the ability to push out the data in a distributed way without being controlled by a central authority.
Aergo is therefore a bridge between the public and private chains, able to guarantee the security of the data but at the same time to share them when necessary.
Aergo & Blocko
Aergo project is developed and supported by Blocko. Blocko is a blockchain infrastructure provider that has been operating in the industry since 2014 helping companies in their approach to this technology. Among these companies there are also Samsung and Hyundai.
Aergo can be considered as the evolution of Coinstack, a blockchain solution of Blocko, from which it has acquired the core technology.
The relationship between Aergo and Blocko is very close on both the development and commercial sides.
The Aergo platform is structured around three main areas of activity
Aergo Chain, a blockchain protocol that works with a deterministic DPoS (Delegated Proof of Stake) consensus algorithm. Has support for Lua & SQL smart contracts (Lua live now, SQL to be developed), which will make it easier to program/find developers than it would be for Solidity. Aergo Hub, a hosting service that serves to create, test, and manage sidechains building on the Aergo chain.
Aergo Marketplace, designed for buying and selling peer-to-peer IT tools such storage and computing power.
Mainnet & Merkle Bridge
The mainnet was launched in April in what they called the "incubation phase" and in June this year they made the Aergo native coin available to the community by launching a swap service, for users that would like to swap their Aergo ERC-20 tokens for Aergo native coins.
Total, simple and fast interoperability between private and public chains is Aergo's stated goal. The technology they have developed to ensure this interoperability is called (not by accident) Merkle Bridge. The purpose of the Merkle Bridge is to enable inter-chain transfers across several Aergo-based blockchains, as well as transfers between Ethereum and Aergo.
The first time that Merkle Bridge technology worked was at the token swap.
The launch of the mainnet 2.0 is scheduled around November 28 and will come with voting rewards, as well as staking rewards for those who stake at least 10k tokens to become a validator. The purpose of the Merkle Bridge is to enable inter-chain transfers across several Aergo-based block chains.
For more info on the Merkle Bridge you can read here: https://medium.com/coinmonks/merkle- bridge-32bd0f06c308
For more info about mainnet you can read here: https://medium.com/aergo/aergo-mainnet- incubation-8f097344d14e
Team
The CEO is Phil Zamani, first COO and now CEO of Blocko. He has 20 years of experience with open source and cloud-based software technology (Linux, Santander, Deutsche Telekom).
He follows the project in every step and has recently moved to Dubai because Aergo has signed important partnerships in the Middle East. Most of the team comes from parent companies like him. Won-Beom Kim is also a founder of both Blocko and Aergo, where he also holds the role of Technology Committee Head.
So far the team has proved to be highly professional, the fact that they have been working together for over five years is something that doesn't happen very often in crypto space. In my opinion the team is one strengths of the project.
Current state of the project
The roadmap (updated in Sept) now expects the end of the main-net incubation period, which should be ready by the end of the year.
Blocko launched in mid October a new Aergo mainnet-based stablecoin to serve a need for a stable value exchange mechanism for users, developers, and businesses utilizing the Aergo platform. This stablecoin is called Aergo Gem.
You can read more about Aergo Gem here: https://medium.com/aergo/blocko-officially-launches- a-stablecoin-on-the-aergo-blockchain-the-aergo-gem-d3a24bd2bd3a
Very interesting the last partnership signed by Aergo with Seed Group, a member of The Private Office of Sheikh Saeed bin Ahmed Al Maktoum in The UAE. In short, they help to guide and to introduce Aergo to some of the largest companies and influential government organizations in this digitally advanced region.
To read more about this partnership you can go here: http://www.the-private-office.com/blocko- aergo-sign-strategic-partnership-with-seed-group/
The gaming industry is apparently one of Aergo's main targets in South Korea right now.
There are two relevant messages that confirm this from Won-Beom Kim in Telegram ( https://t.me/ aergoofficial/99316 ) ( https://t.me/aergoofficial/99318 ).
Lua is a programming language used by some game developers, so having Lua support on Aergo makes it integrating blockchain in their games easier.
In the last Quarterly Project Update, the goals for the near future are summarized in three key areas:
1_Continued execution of technology roadmap.
2_Establish partnerships with key partner that will advance the Aergo ecosystem.
3_Pursue early customer prospects in two regions: South Korea and united Arabi Emirates in a highly focused push to gain large reference projects before further global expansion.
The project is definitely active, there are many articles on mediums and the website is always updated with the latest documents. On social media they don't have a very large community (less than 10 thousand followers on twitter) but also from the communication viewpoint they have shown reliability and skills.
Possible problems and weaknesses
Data is a new oil, a very rich and highly competitive industry. The competition is tough on the technology side from Hyperledger, Ethereum implementations and Icon, but there's also very strong competition on the services side from IBM, Ernst & Young and growing companies such as Universa and Quantum. Some of these, and others major tech companies, have made their own blockchain products already available for business roll-out.
The hybrid blockchain isn't new idea in crypto space.
The concrete absence of real new customers is the most worrying factor right now.
Positive features
Blocko has relationships with more than 50 companies at the moment.
Blocko has decided to make away with the legacy Coinstack product and migrate its existing and future customers to Aergo, joining everything together in a new product line that builds on the new Aergo blockchain.
The migration of a portion of Blocko's customers to Aergo is planned once the Mainnet and Merkle Bridge Architecture will finish the incubation phase and will be considered trusted and safe.
The strategy of expanding in the Middle East, where the border between state and companies is very slim, could open the channel of cooperation with government authorities.
They have enough cash to execute their vision.
Samsung recently adding Aergo to its blockchain wallet, this could suggest future collaboration.
You can see Aergo in Samsung commercial here: https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=vgI1DbH1gFc&feature=youtu.be&t=109
Funding
Raised 30 million USD from reaching hard cap of private token sale (https://medium.com/aergo/ aergo-project-backers-83b60b960c35). According to Phil Zamani they should have enough funds to at least make it to the end of 2020 (https://t.me/aergoofficial/96873).
Token supply
Aergo Token's total supply is 500M. Updated token supply figures are on page 32 of Aergo Quarterly Project Update Q3 2019 (https://paper.aergo.io/AERGO_QPU_Q3_2019_1.1.0.pdf). Total circulating supply in this Nov 4th report is 155,138,095. Estimated circulating supply by end of 2019 is 248,235,086 tokens, so about 93,000,000 more tokens by the end of the year, which if my math is correct should be a 60% increase in circulating supply in the space of a couple of months. I’m guessing this should be due to staking/voting rewards.
About 150M are reserved for building and sustaining the Aergo Platform and supporting ecosystem. These are what they call Aergo Platform Token Reserve. Approximately 100M remain to be distributed.
What's the token for?
The Aergo tokens has various uses within the ecosystem. Everything that happens inside the sidechains connected to the Aergo mainnet must be paid in Aergo tokens or needs Aergo tokens to work.
For example, an Aergo token fee is required for the execution of smart contracts, even if the use of the main-net is free. The side chains will need Aergo tokens to work and to remain anchored to the Aergo main-net. Requests for consulting, support and additional application services will be paid in native tokens. Aergo tokens staking is needed to secure the network, manage block producers and support the Aergo mainnet ecosystem.
So what does the growth in the value of the token depend on?
Obviously it depends on how many customers will use Aergo's architecture to build their own custom blockchains.
Let me know if it is useful and if you want more.
Obviously thank you for your time, have a good day.