Important dates: Q1 2018 public sale
Number of tokens: 100 million fixed
Cap: $8.5 million
Token type: ERC-20 token built on the Ethereum blockchain
What is Tomochain?
Tomochain is a blockchain platform. It will host smart contracts and will allow for decentralized applications to be built using the Tomochain infrastructure. The Tomo application will be the first consumer application built on the Tomo blockchain. It will be a decentralized social network that uses the Tomocoin as a native cryptocurrency. Tomocoin will be an ERC20 token issued on the Ethereum blockchain, which will operate via the native Tomochain blockchain using smart contracts.
What is the problem Tomochain wants to solve?
The white paper references scalability as one of the most significant issues facing current generation blockchains. The Tomochain ecosystem aims to be highly scalable and have negligible transaction fees. It is not entirely clear what other problems Tomocoin is solving that haven’t already been looked at by competitors; see below for details of competitors for decentralized social networks.
What is Tomochain’s business plan?
Tomochain has been in development since early 2017. In Q2 2018, Tomocoin is to be integrated into Tomochain and in Q3 the Tomo app and Tomo wallet are to be released.
ICO
50% of Tomocoins are to be sold in the token sale. 15% goes to the team and advisers and vests over a four-year period. The final 35% will be used to incentivize business and the community. In order to participate in the crowdsale, investors were required to submit a proof-of-caring application. As part of the proof, community members had to do something to promote Tomocoin, such as a blog post.
Token utility
Tomocoin will have a similar function to Ether. It will be used to issue tokens on the Tomochain as well as a unit of value to make transactions. It is unclear to me if it will be needed to pay for transactions, as the team has indicated that these will be virtually free.
The team
The current Tomocoin team consists of four people. The most notable member of the team is Long Vuong, who was a co-founder of the NEM blockchain. Notable advisors include members of the Bee Token team, Qlink and Devery.
Hype
Tomocoin has over 18,000 people in its Telegram channel. Considering this is a project that has done no marketing, that is an excellent number.
Competition
The white paper provides a competitive analysis of competitive projects, which I will summarize:
Steem: The Steem platform is a social content network that the Tomocoin whitepaper acknowledges is quite similar. However, they point out that the Tomo platform will have more video content and will focus within Asia.
Kin: Kin is to be the native cryptocurrency of the Kik instant messaging platform. The Tomocoin whitepaper points out that the Kin ecosystem will be migrated to Stellar, while Tomocoin will remain on the Ethereum platform.
The platform competitors need to be singled out. While Tomocoin seems to be complementing Ether, there are other platforms to consider as well, such as EOS, Icon and Cardano among others.
Risks
Business: Like Zilliqa, this is a project that has a very strong tech team but one that lacks in business skills. However strong the product, it will not succeed without marketing and business development. After concluding their crowdsale, the Tomocoin team should prioritize hiring on the business side.
Focus: After reading the white paper, I am still unclear as to what Tomocoin is supposed to do. On one hand, it seems to be the coin to power a decentralized social network. On the other hand, it seems to be a new blockchain platform that aims to resolve Ethereum’s deficiencies. It is unclear to me how the Tomo app will integrate with third party applications. The white paper needs to offer a clearer summary of what Tomocoin and Tomochain are.
Investment Horizon
Short Term: The short-term potential of Tomocoin is excellent. The project has a tiny cap and is a blockchain platform project, which have historically performed exceedingly well.
Long Term: The long-term potential of the project is less clear. There is a huge amount of competition and the rationale for this project is not clear. The Tomochain ecosystem lacks the funding of the other blockchain platforms and lacks the name recognition. It will be tough to stand out.
Conclusion
The token economics and short-term potential of Tomocoin are outstanding. This is a strong flip, but less of a strong long-term hold given the competitors and lack of project focus. Nevertheless, any project that tries to solve scalability issues has the potential to be a winner, and investors should seriously consider Tomocoin.
