About a month ago (Feb 13th 2018) I attended a Bitcoins in Bali Meetup at Blockchain Zoo, which is in Ubud, Bali. Stephen DeMeulenaere was on site to walk us through the new blockchain tech he's evangelising – Pundi X.
PundiX is a point of sale (POS) cryptocurrency gateway terminal that utilises NFC-enabled cards to buy and pay Bitcoin, Ether, Litecoin and in the near future, Digix Gold (DGX) and DigixDAO (DGD) Tokens.
To put is simply, devices like these on premises are going to make spending crypto super easy at an every day transaction level... and make it easy for retailer to receive payment in their local currency. The familiarity of tapping with a card or scanning a QR code from your phone will be easy for the average consumer to understand and use.
Watch a video of Stephen's walkthrough of the device on dTube:
What I've learned about Pundi X:
- Pundi X have raised $40m USD in ICO (NPXS), $23m USD of that in pre-sales within 2hrs
- Investors include Pantara Capital
- There is a simple two step process (converting currency + paying) at the POS, where you can pay with your mobile (QR code) or tap you card
- The device turns cryptocurrency and foreign currency into local currency at the POS +
- There are three sizes of the device (small mobile, normal POS size and desktop size)
- The exchange depends on the jurisdiction
- Currently exchanges are bidding to handle Pundi X business
- The technology could be used for digital identity, voting and loans in future
- Pundi X has partnered with the Korean exchange Coinnest to issue 300,000 Pundi X multi-cryptocurrency POS cards to their members
- PundiX has recently partnered with Blockchain Centre Vilnius in Lithuania to open Europe's first International Blockchain Centre.
Pundi X have also announced they are shipping 4,000 Pundi X POS devices in Q2 2018 to Japan, Korea, Singapore, and Switzerland. 500 devices are also available for individual order for 31 countries.
I'm so glad I've learned about this tech, and am sure it's one of many to come that will support a better cryptocurrency ecosystem. I believe mainstream adoption will be greatly influenced by retail stores starting to accept digital currencies across the world, for everyday small transactions by average consumers. This is a great start!
