Curate offers a Gasless, blockchain agnostic, all-in-one NFT Marketplace. In this post I will analyse the Curate project, and rate it in terms of the 'Vision' criteria in the SVET framework. This rating is conducted from an unsponsored, unbiased perspective and serves merely an informative purpose- not as financial advice (!)
Recap of Framework
The framework is designed for technology analysts to be able to assign as close to an objective rating as possible on the merits of a project.
Within the review of a project's 'Vision', the following criteria is assessed:
SVET Vision Rating:
- Singularity: you have to check out project’s Competitors.
- Volume: you have to gauge project’s targeted Market’s Size and number of platform’s Users.
- Empathy: you have to weigh up project’s Community.
- Timing / TimeLine: you have to analyse project’s future Development Plans.
The rating is assigned from a scale of a, b and c, with the +/- variant indicating a strong/ weak performer respectively in that category.
Vision Review
Singularity
There are numerous positives to the ‘Singularity’ of this project, but also a few concerns from competitors as well as on the basis of the lack of empirical performance. For one, it is self-endorsed as “the world's first blockchain agnostic gasless physical goods and NFT marketplace that also serves as a gasless multichain bridge between major chains such as ETH, BNB, ALGO, EGLD, AVAX” (Curate, 2021). To decompose this endorsement, it is undoubtedly at an advantage in being able to use all major blockchains as many of the already existing competitors in the NFT space are not agnostic, most choosing between competing chains Binance and Ethereum’s respective standards: BEP-721, BEP-1155, ERC-721, ERC-1155 (Geyser, 2021).
However, the bigger advantage, allowing it to gain a footing not only in the industry, but above existing leader and giant ‘Opensea’, is in the promised fusion of the physical goods market with the NFT marketplace as planned in their roadmap in the third quarter of 2021 (Curate, 2021). If all goes according to plan, this is an alluring improvement as it will steal competition from establish NFT marketplace brands, making it the market leader in the fusion of both types of ecommerce. To take this with a pinch of salt is very important however, as ecommerce platform giant ‘Shopify’ is planning in “permitting its merchants to sell NFTs” (Portfolio Insider, 2021) leading to a major competitor entering the same space. This is still the less concerning doubt, as even with such plans of adoption from Shopify, there will not be enough saturation to trouble either project, and the more pressing matter is no existing empirical performance of such a marketplace and thus evidence in support of demand for the multi-dimensional product.
Curate thus seems to be offering a unique solution - but not the only one to have noticed the potential in this gap - leading to competitor interest and leaving the project with a ‘Singularity’ rating of b+.
Volume
It’s no secret that the NFT marketplace has exploded in 2021, with top sources estimating sales volume to have hit $2.5 billion in the first and second quarters (Howcroft, 2021). The largest database of NFT markets, ‘NonFungible’, reported almost half of that figure, $1.15 billion in the last month alone, midway into the third quarter (NonFungible, 2021). The exponential boom in the industry is uncontested and leaves enough room for the multitude of NFT marketplaces without the space becoming too saturated.
At the same time as established financial institutions such as NASDAQ starting to notice of the NFT industry setting weekly records in sales volume, investment and attention keeps piling into this space with American media giant ‘Fox Entertainment’, lining up a “$100 million investment to create NFTs on character and background art, as well as GIFs” (Portfolio Insider, 2021). Ultimately it would be a mistake to understate the demand in this market, though a few ask questions of the saturation in supply which is why it is all the more impressive from Curate to meticulously pay attention to filling a vacuum instead. This is the opening to their whitepaper with a dedicated section to present “problems”, such as “no real aggregation of NFTs… [or] filtration of low quality NFTs” (Curate, 2021), conveniently met with the solutions they offer.
Thus, the project not only seems to operate in a booming market, but also pays attention to its gaps in supply. Undoubtedly, this scores a robust ‘Volume’ rating (a).
Empathy
The project has proven to be particularly socially aware, allowing it to gain in a philanthropic light as much as a goal oriented one towards the ends of a functional marketplace. Two such developments are it’s ‘carbon neutrality’ as well as $10 million donation to India’s Covid-19 relief earlier in the year (Curate, 2021). The first in particular allows it to stand in the face of increasing backlash towards the industry’s energy footprint.
One outstanding feature of Curate’s community is the vast number of platforms it operates on, not limiting itself to two or three main channels. In addition to the industry favourites as of recent, Telegram and Twitter, it has a presence on Instagram, Youtube, Facebook, Discord and Reddit to name the majority. This by no means indicates high community interaction however, as it’s telegram has roughly 20,000 members and on Instagram and Facebook, despite maintaining over 5000 followers, rarely scratches above 100 likes on its posts. This could be attributable to inefficient marketing strategies on these platforms, or more plausibly to this being a relatively young project.
As such there seems to be nothing too special about this project’s community to help it stand out securing it an average ‘Empathy’ rating (b).
Timing
Curate’s development plans are surprisingly well substantiated, not merely due to the backdrop of a booming industry, but also various secured partnerships granting its system and token, XCUR, various use cases. The token can be spent on over 3 million travel products at ‘Travala’ and 7 million holidays and flights on ‘Expedia’. This sets it up well to integrate into the industry, as well as have a reach out of it. One rather fragile use-case highlighted in the white paper, however, is the ability to “exchange for FIAT and 1000’s other cryptocurrencies” through their partners (Curate, 2021). Made to sound impressive, would not give the token an advantage in itself as the variety of instruments it can be exchanged for is through the use of third party exchanges.
However, it’s quarter four plan for ‘KuCoin’ support for deposits and withdrawals, should be sufficient in guaranteeing users an effective, more mainstream means to take their earnings off the platform (Curate, 2021). It was granted a listing on the aforementioned exchange, as well as ‘Gate.io’ just earlier this year. In the second quarter of 2022, it has even bigger plans for a ‘Binance Pay’ integration which is the point that a lot of new projects look forward to as it scores a high amount of traffic from the leading exchange. Another source of heightened traffic should be the Affiliate Program for both buyers and sellers launching later this year.
Thus, though there are many promising plans in the pipelines still, there is still much infrastructure to be put in place to guarantee user traffic. This will grant it an average, but improving, ‘Timing’ rating (b+).
Verdict
Singularity (b+), Volume (a), Empathy (b), Timeline (b+).
References
Mutatiina, J., Yurtseven, C. and Blaauw, E., 2021. From data mess to a data mesh. [online] Deloitte Netherlands. Available at: <https://www2.deloitte.com/nl/nl/pages/strategy-analytics-and-ma/articles/from-data-mess-to-a-data-mesh.html> [Accessed 21 August 2021].
Stratos, 2021. About Us. [online] thestratos.org. Available at: <https://www.thestratos.org/about.html#scroll> [Accessed 21 August 2021].
Stratos, 2021. Product. [online] thestratos.org. Available at: <https://www.thestratos.org/#Data-Arch> [Accessed 21 August 2021].
Stratos, 2021. Stratos Whitepaper. 1st ed. [ebook] thestratos.org, pp.6-40. Available at: <https://www.thestratos.org/assets/pdf/stratoswhitepaper.pdf> [Accessed 21 August 2021].
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