WaBi coin is a cryptocurrency project that has created a blockchain based loyalty programme. This is to encourage and reward consumers to purchase products through the parent company Walimai. By linking digital and physical assets through RFID (Radio-frequency identification) with built in security and anti-copy functionality, Walimai have allowed consumers to verify that the product they are going to buy is not counterfeit. With huge potential in China alone WaBi Coin could help to revolutionise the anti-counterfeiting market.
The Basics of WaBi Coin
WaBi coin is a digital cryptocurrency that consumers can use to purchase products by Walimai. Walimai is a company that places secure anti-counterfeit labels on consumer products, which can then be verified by customers themselves on Walimai’s application when they scan the RFID chip. Due to Walimai owning WaBi (蛙币), they have created a reward scheme to incentivise Walimai users to make purchases with their coin. Users will be rewarded in multiple ways when they buy Walimai protected products with WaBi tokens in a similar way to a loyalty programme. For example, users of WaBi will get discounts and special offers on products, as well as discounted WaBi tokens. Furthermore the buyers will receive free WaBi tokens whenever they scan a Walimai protected product, therefore effectively ‘mining’ tokens. This benefits the merchants as well, since the loyalty programmes will help them sell their products i.e. ‘buy this product and get 1 WaBi coin’.
Walimai Technology was created out of the fear of imported fake goods in China and the desire for a more reliable anti-counterfeiting technology. Through the use of RFID technology they have created something that has the potential to overtake QR codes in quality and popularity. Where QR codes can be replicated in pictures even when they are encrypted, each of Walimai’s labels have a unique chip in which the data is constantly changing randomly, creating ‘dynamic data’. Therefore counterfeiters are unable to copy the data as it will quickly become out of date if security was broken. The base of this product is the application, which users can download on their smartphone and then use to scan products before or after purchase to check their credibility.
Watch the video below for more information on how the label works:
The security of digital transactions was ensured by cryptographic technology like Blockchains, however there was rarely this level of security for the link between physical and digital assets. This is why Walimai technology is so original, as they have devised a solution that confirms the sale of physical goods, verified to be authentic, through the use of a blockchain which allows every transaction to be publicly visible.
Walimai’s WaBi coin based system makes use of the bootstrapping effect, as it dismisses the question of ‘how do i get someone to buy my coin?’ and instead will organically create miners through the fear of accidentally buying counterfeited products. This will then bring in more WaBi coin users because they can use their free WaBi tokens for discounted products. Overall a positive feedback system is created.
Roadmap
History
Wabi Coin’s parent company Walimai was initially conceived in September of 2013 with official operations starting in February of 2014 in the Science Park of Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China, with the aim to solve the problem of fake food and pharmaceutical products in circulation around the world. Fake foods have cost the lives of 63 babies in China in 2004 due to the consumption of fake baby milk. In addition to this, 6 infants died in 2008 and thousands more were hospitalised.
For most of 2014 Walimai’s leadership was part of a strategic turnaround project for a top-5 global infant food producer.
2015 sees Walimai prototyping anti-counterfeiting technology and winning a innovation grant from the Jiaxing municipal government. Walimai also becomes incorporated in Zhejiang province, China.
In 2016 the iOS and Android apps launch and a new version of the RFID label is developed, with sales beginning in December 2016.
2017 brings the first 3 infant nutrition stores to Walimai and the WaBi blockchain loyalty system is developed and implemented.
Future
In 2018 Walimai plan to start a series of partnerships with producers and distributors of baby food and alcohol with Walimai secure labels.
A further look into the future sees WaBi Coin being used in other areas, specifically building loyalty programmes for product manufacturers.
WaBi Coin also plans to partner with insurance companies some time in 2019.
Team
WaBi have an impressive young team behind them. The two co-founders, Alexander Busarov and Yaz Belinskiy are both graduates from the London School of Economics with Yaz also graduating from the University of Oxford. They’re both fluent in Mandarin Chinese, have both worked in consulting and have had both managerial and directorial roles for large management consulting firms.
The rest of the team are equally as capable, with most of them achieving high level degrees from respectable universities.
The development team are backed up with a group of advisors that have worked for some of the leading companies in many sectors. For example, Mario F. Pazos who now specialises as a blockchain advisor used to be the Vice President of the Regional Prepaid and Personal Payments Head of MasterCard.
Trading Information
The WaBi Coin ICO finished on the 28th December 2017. Since then the WaBi Coin price has looked strong and has maintained a relatively close price relationship with other altcoins.
How to Buy WaBi Coin
As of 23rd January 2018 there are two exchanges that offer WaBi Coin. The first being Binance and the second is EtherDelta. We’d highly recommend using Binance as it is comprehensively the cheapest way to buy WaBi coin.
As Binance is a cryptocurrency only exchange we’d recommend signing up to Coinbase or Coinmama to buy Ethereum or Bitcoin and then using that to buy the WaBi tokens.
Read More: Coinbase Review – Is Coinbase Safe?
How to Store WaBi Coin
As WaBi coins are an Ethereum based ERC20 token they can be stored on any ERC20 compatible wallet. A wallet we highly recommend is MyEtherWallet. The setup is fairly easy and it gives you the ability to store any Ethereum based coin.
A better option would be to store your WaBi Coin on a hardware wallet, such as a Ledger Nano S or a Trezor.
Competition
The major competition that WaBi Coin faces is that from a coin called Waltonchain. They are using a similar RFID system to initially help with severe problems with stock, storage and after sale services in the clothing industry. Eventually, Waltonchain plans to expand away from just clothing and move onto all forms of asset management and even intelligent packaging.
Whilst Waltonchain and WaBi Coin are doing very similar thing with RFID their core markets are quite different. This should allow enough space for both companies to grow substantially.
WaBi also have competition from other companies such as the eBay founder backed Provenance. Provenance aims to solve a very similar problem as WaBi Coin in that they are adding a digital history to food items using blockchain technology but without a coin to accompany it.
Our Opinion on WaBi Coin
Walimai and WaBi have developed a very interesting technology that we think has a lot of potential. The team is good, with a lot of enthusiastic young members and some quality advisors. If they manage to deliver what they’ve promised then we see it being very successful.
Pros and Cons
Pros
Good team members and advisors with a great idea and a solid plan.
Potential to benefit from the macro trends in China. For example, they are focusing on baby food and formula and in 2015 China got rid of its one child policy which will greatly boost the demand for baby products. In addition to this there is a huge counterfeiting problem in China and people are willing to pay a premium to ensure the authenticity of what they are buying.
Cons
The technology behind the coin and the RFID anti-counterfeit systems are still in relatively early development. There also seems to be a lack of technical data on the whitepaper that would have been very welcome.
The company is based in Singapore but the main operations are in China. Cryptocurrency in China is also liable to a lot of regulatory problems.
Final Thoughts
Overall WaBi Coin is off to a good start in large part due to its funding and backing by the already established company Walimai, and at the time of writing this its valuation has gone through the roof to almost US$3.00 from it’s $0.25 ICO price. It will almost definitely see some competition in the form of Waltoncoin and Provenance, however they are different enough to both grow in their own right as Waltoncoin and Provenance are both tailored to general supply chain management systems and WaBi Coin is in the anti-counterfeiting market. We personally think Walimai has come up with a great idea and WaBi Coin is a solid cryptocurrency.