Post from: https://medium.com/@teamhycon/glosfer-issues-cryptocurrency-hycon-7e5a6139ae1d
Korean Company Aims to be the Next Generation of Blockchain
[The following is an English translation of an interview with DongA,
parts of the article are edited for clarity and readability]
On January 5, Glosfer, a Korean blockchain technology company, produced the genesis block of its cryptocurrency “HYCON” (HYC). A genesis block is the first block of a blockchain network. Glosfer plans to expand its genesis block to issue its cryptocurrency HYCON by mid-year.
HYCON is issued to assess the technical performance of ‘Infinity Platform,’ the next generation blockchain technology that Glosfer is developing. So, what sets the Infinity Platform apart from other blockchain technologies in the market, such as “Ethereum” and “Hyperledger”? We interviewed Tae Won Kim, the CEO of Glosfer, to find out more about the Infinity Platform and why he issued a cryptocurrency.
Q: What is Glosfer?
A: Glosfer is a company dedicated to developing a blockchain-related technology. We have two business divisions: one for blockchain technology development and commercialization, and another for fin-tech. I just mentioned fin-tech in an attempt to sound fancy, but in reality, it is a cryptocurrency exchange. (laughs). Currently, we are focused more on developing blockchain technology.
Q. What is the goal of the Infinity platform? Is it oriented toward a public blockchain like Ethereum? Or is it aiming for a private blockchain like Hyperledger?
A. The goal of the Infinity platform is to be a public blockchain like Ethereum. The advantages of blockchain are mainly three: permissionless, group verification, and falsification prevention.
Private blockchain is a technology that abandoned the advantage of blockchain which is decentralization to increase transaction speed and the amount of data that can be processed on blockchain.
The ultimate direction of blockchain is being a public blockchain. Therefore, we are concentrating on developing a public blockchain. Of course, it doesn’t mean that we will not develop technologies related to private blockchain. Developing technologies related to public blockchain can naturally help the company to acquire technologies related to private blockchain as well. In the future, if the market requires private blockchain technology, we can alter some parts of public blockchain technology and offer it to the market.
Q. What kind of blockchain technology are you developing?
A. Originally, we worked on developing a blockchain that can be incorporated into actual services, utilizing already existing open source blockchains in the market, such as Ethereum and Hyperledger. However, after analyzing blockchains in the market, we realized that it would be difficult to reach our desired level of technology.
Suppose we utilize Ethereum; it was easy to establish a number of additional services on it, but it was impossible to improve the speed of the transactions, an underlying problem of Ethereum. Although Ethereum is a great blockchain for storing various information, including smart contracts, the fact that it could only handle 15 transactions per second was a major drawback. Since we were not part of Ethereum Consortium, we could not engage in addressing this issue. At this point, we decided to come up with our own blockchain technology, which we have been working on since last January. We named the blockchain “Infinity platform.”
Spreading the word
Q. What makes the Infinity platform better than the existing blockchain technology?
A. Our goal is to secure two advantages. The first advantage is ‘complete decentralization.’ We would create a network where developers will be able to easily create a completely independent blockchain network without being reliant on existing blockchain networks.
In the case of Ethereum, the company claims that it can create a decentralized system, but in the end, whatever service you develop, you have to run the service on Ethereum network. Last year, Ethereum-based game service ‘CryptoKitties’ caused excessive traffic and paralyzed the entire Ethereum network. Excessive use of Ethereum network by someone like this will cause damage to other services using the same Ethereum network.
Even though you create a service based on the Infinity platform, the service is not dependent on Infinity network. Developers can take advantage of the Infinity platform, which will be available as an API in open-source or cloud computing services, as an infrastructure for their services.
Advanced developers with more than five to ten years of experience in the industry can analyze open-source blockchains on the market to create a new blockchain network that is completely independent of existing networks. (Reporter note: Creating a new network that is independent of existing blockchain networks is called “hard fork.”) However, how would developers who have less than five years of experience or those who need to solely focus on service development develop a hard fork service?
Since the Infinity platform will enable developers to create an independent network in the first place, developers can focus on developing services that use the blockchain technology without being pressured to develop a hard fork.
The second advantage is ‘to ensure efficient interoperability with existing centralized database (central DB).’ Blockchain is not a silver bullet. It can not contain all the data. Some blockchain researchers say that all data can be stored in blockchain, but I can not agree with that opinion as a blockchain designer who tries to apply blockchain technology in our daily life.
It is inefficient to put data that should not be disclosed (for example, personal information) in blockchain. This data should be stored in a secure central database as we have done so far. Data that should not be falsified (for example, trading books) should be contained in blocks within the blockchain.
Therefore, interoperability between the central database and the blockchain is important. By storing data in both central DB and blockchain we can catch two hares which are privacy and falsification prevention.
Glosfer has worked with Nongwon-gu district in Seoul to develop a blockchain based local currency called “NW”. It is impossible to move all government services to blockchain, as there are various standards, security standards, and restrictions set by laws and regulations required by the government.
[Local currency: It is an alternative currency issued by a local government or local community that enables local residents to use it only in the local area. Seongnam City’s ‘Youth Dividend’ is the prime example.]
For this reason, we have made NW by using both central database and blockchain technology (the prototype of Infinity platform). It is a compromise we made to keep the advantages of blockchain while keeping within all the laws and regulations. NW processes 40% of the total system in the central database and 60% in the blockchain. Membership registration and personal information archiving are handled in the central DB, while wallet account creation, which is the core technology of the local currency system, and unique value identification key are processed in the blockchain. All transaction books are stored both in blockchain network and central DB. Through this, the system is designed in a way that we don’t store local residents’ personal information outside and also give rights to everyone to view the transaction books and at the same time preventing any falsification of it.
In 2018, various blockchain technologies are expected to compete in the market to gain dominance. The goal of the Infinity platform is to complete a blockchain technology that can take the lead in this blockchain market.
Blockchain technology enhances security, transparency, and efficiency
Q. Why did you issue a cryptocurrency — HYCON — while developing blockchain technology? Is it true that blockchain and cryptocurrency are not separable as some say?
A. In conclusion, blockchain and cryptocurrency are separate elements. Technically, they can easily be separated.
The problem with current blockchain technology is that there is no ‘must use blockchain’ application or service. There is no additional service that must use blockchain technology, the only service that must use blockchain is cryptocurrency. We aim to make blockchain used in many industries.
Blockchain is a hole that can be screwed. Currently, the only screw we discovered that fits this hole is cryptocurrency. However, we would be able to discover other screws as blockchain technology becomes more sophisticated and various tests are carried out.
Think about when the database was first developed. At that time, we had to run only one service and only one database on one server. It was inefficient. But as technology has evolved, database utilization has increased significantly. We are able to have multiple databases on one server or connect multiple services to a single database. There are various way to apply this technology such as connecting multiple databases to one service.
Blockchain technology is just at the beginning stage. We can not claim that the database technology in the 1970s is obsolete when we compare it with current stage of technology. If blockchain technology evolves, the infinite usage will emerge as well.
The reason why Glosfer issued HYCON is the same reason for issuing an Alt Coin (Alternative Coin) in the commercial market. It is to develop a faster transaction processing technology. While I was studying Ethereum a while ago, I was feeling uneasy about Ethereum’s slow transaction throughput. In order to learn how to improve transaction processing speed, we developed a separate cryptocurrency and developed Infinity platform based on these studies.
We are now looking for ways to improve the transaction speed of the Infinity platform by releasing HYCON in the market.
Q. When will the Infinity platform be released to businesses and developers? How can Glosfer benefit from the launch of the Infinity platform?
A. We are working on the development of Infinity platform targeting the release of the first version during June to July this year. Glosfer’s goal is simple. We focus only on developing and completing the blockchain platform, and developing services using blockchains is left to other companies and developers.
Blockchain technology still has a long way to go. There is still much room for improvement. Depending on how far the improvement is going to be done, the decision on blockchain will be made. It can stay in the network protocol (network signal processing technology) stage or venture into the domain of database.
If blockchain stays in the network protocol stage, services using the blockchain technology will be limited. But if blockchain successfully enters the realm of database, a lot of services using blockchain technology will be poured out, and the world of blockchains will be opened.
These improvements should be made by specialized blockchain companies such as Glosfer. Companies can create services that are useful to users based on these improved technologies. Glosfer has made all of the source technology open source for the Infinity platform. We will openly share our technology in this fashion, except certain parts of the technology directly related to the operation of our business, everything else is open source. Many people wonder how our company can make money if we disclose the source technology in this open source way. Just remember the example of Linux. Linux is open source and open to anyone. Enterprises and developers can use Linux to develop a variety of services. Instead, you are left with a choice of whether to fix the problem yourself or to get help from a Linux specialist (for example, Red Hat) when you are faced with a barrier while developing. Many companies are asking Linux specialists for help to save time and money.
The Infinity platform is also available to anyone like Linux. Enterprises and developers can use the Infinity platform to develop their own blockchain technology and commercialize their services. However, if there are any obstacles on the road of development of the service, they will ask Glosfer for help. This is Glosfer’s business model using open source.
The Infinity platform will be offered to enterprises and developers in two forms. The first form is where all the codes are disclosed in open source. It can be downloaded from an open source distribution site, such as GitHub, and be applied to the company’s services. The second is to bring the Infinity platform to the cloud and provide it in the form of an API so that it can connect to the enterprise service. It is suitable for companies and developers who want to use the Infinity platform more easily.
Glosfer is working with Microsoft to provide blockchain technology through the cloud. Our company was originally developing a blockchain technology based on C ++, but initially, developers found it too difficult to develop, so we developed the Infinity platform using ‘TypeScript’.
In the future, we will bring the Infinity platform to Microsoft’s cloud service ‘Azure’ and provide APIs to companies. It means we will be Microsoft’s software services (SaaS) partner.
At present, Microsoft is offering Hyperledger and Ethereum in the cloud, and the Infinity platform is expected to grow in popularity if it is offered to users together with these two in the cloud.
[TypeScript: A variant of JavaScript that Microsoft has released for developing large-scale apps and services. Although JavaScript has the advantage of being easy to use, it has disadvantages that it can be used only for web page development and it is difficult to apply to the development of apps and services. TypeScripts are a programming language designed to solve this.]
Article Source: http://it.donga.com/27312/
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