Year 2021 was a year full of progress and achievements for the iOWN Group, not only for our team but our partners and customers. We added more utility to our wallet and the app is the feature that allows wallet users to pay for merchants on the ecosystem. The payments are enabled by our sister company, IN4X Global which also allows for direct purchase of iOWN Tokens, ETH and USDT. We partnered with industry-leading Amlak Digital, Amlak Digital is privately held company which invest in Dubai real estate market. All features and updates are bringing further adoption to Blockchain technologies and Crypto!
IOWN Wallet
Our goal is to create a seamless experience with the iOWN Wallet, where users can utilize the wallet to interact with the iOWN Ecosystem. The iOWN wallet Version 2.0 is a major update and contains an integration with the cryptocurrency exchange platform, IN4X Global, allowing for fiat purchases of iOWN Token along with other Crypto-currencies like ETH and Stablecoin USDT. With this integration, users are able to instantly purchase Crypto using their debit or credit cards, without having to go through other centralized exchanges.
The wallet has an added feature to enable IN4X Global Partners to accept Crypto-currency payments. A lot more partners will be able to use this feature in the future to enable more Crypto-currency adoption in the long run.
The main priority we had is to improve the user experience on the app. Apart from bug fixes, we implemented a significant upgrade to support Ethereum EIP-1559, this allows Ethereum Gas Fees to be transparent for users during transactions.
iOWN Token
Tokenomics Updates
Market Cap Growth
The iOWN Token started at a conservative market capitalization off $4M and grew to a $20M market cap, marking our all-time high to a price of $0.09 per token!
Exchange Listings
The iOWN Group signed an initial agreement with the Coins Bit exchange and we are set to list the iOWN Token with them in early Q1 2022.
The major technical updates on the token along with a potential Polygon and Binance Smart Chain integration will allow us to further diversify where the iOWN Token can be offered. At the moment the token is available to trade on the app itself, and other centralized exchanges. But with the technical updates approaching, we are looking into listing the token on decentralized exchanges like Uniswap and Pancake Swap.
Technical Updates
Multi-Chain Support:
BSC Blockchain Support
Our developers are working towards supporting iOWN Token within the Binance Smart Chain blockchain Ecosystem, enabling more than 125 million wallets to hold and use the iOWN token, and leveraging the DEFI ecosystem of BSC that hosts more than 7 million transactions per day.
Polygon Blockchain Support
iOWN Holders will be utilizing the Polygon ecosystem soon. The Polygon iOWN Infrastructure is at the testing phase at the moment. Polygon proved itself as the dominant layer 2 solutions on top of Ethereum, with a market cap of $18B. Polygon’s infrastructure offers very low gas fees, with a high rate of adoption. iOWN holders will benefit from the Polygon DeFi ecosystem in early 2022, and save a lot on Gas Fees.
ERC Standard Upgrade
iOWN Engineering team has been working for the past quarter in upgrading the iOWN smart contract standard from ERC-223 to ERC-20/BEP-20 as a step forward to enable listing at DEXs and enable the usage of the iOWN token with different DeFi applications and utilities. This upgrade will be the first step toward a wide range of iOWN enablement in the DEFI world.
Cross-Chain Bridge integration
iOWN will provide the holders and investors with the ability to move their assets across chains by integrating a DeFi Cross-Chain bridge. iOWN holders and investors will be able to move the iOWN token and assets across the Ethereum Network, Polygon, and Binance Smart Chain seamlessly at any given time.
iOWN DeFi Infrastructure
2021 was the year of DeFi, a boom the DeFi ecosystem just occurred, with mass adoption of blockchain, cryptocurrencies, and DeFi usage. IOWN was busy preparing a wide range of technologies and updates that will act as the building blocks of IOWN DeFi infrastructure, a series of updates will come to the iOWN Wallet, and IN4X Exchange, followed by different DeFi integrations that will be rolled up gradually.
DEX Listing
During 2022, iOWN will be available at different DEXs including UNISWAP (ETH/Polygon) and Pancakeswap, giving access to iOWN assets for millions of daily active users at these decentralized exchanges, and enabling a wide-range of DeFi utilities and applications to be leveraged within the iOWN ecosystem.
DEFI & NFT: Real state and Properties
iOWN team spent the past quarter testing and optimizing iOWNX to go DeFi. We are studying the possibility of this integration specifically with iOWN Property, which potentially democratizes access to real estate investment opportunities, where anyone in the world with a DeFi wallet will be able to own, sell, and make profits, and it’s all decentralized, managed and maintained over the blockchain using a highly sophisticated smart contract and NFT technologies.
iOWN Property
The iOWN Property platform is a real estate crowdfunding platform that allows individuals to invest in income-generating properties. The platform is ready to launch and is going through BETA testing. Our administration is working closely with the local regulators in order to acquire the right licenses.
The properties listed on the platform are carefully listed by market experts evaluated on criteria like; Capital Preservation, Rental Yield (Stable Income), and Value Appreciation of the property.
Amlak Digital is a privately held company that invests in Dubai real estate, it is focused on enhancing investors’ portfolios by offering risk-adjusted opportunities in the UAE real estate market.
Amlak digital will be our main partner that will enable access to real estate opportunities in the UAE market through the listings of properties. The listings will allow investors to purchase property on the iOWN Property platform and pay with iOWN Token, and USDT, enabling further adoption in the iOWN and Crypto-currency ecosystem.
Given the market need and trends, and following our vision in offering a complete ecosystem to provide our users a seamless experience, iOWN Group Co-founded IN4X Global, a Crypto-currency exchange, which allows users to buy the iOWN token, ETH, and USDT within the app. IN4X global obtained trading in crypto commodities license from crypto valley DMCC.
IN4X’s platform is also a Crypto Payment Solution. We implemented a quick, secure and easy-to-use Payment Gateway that allows both businesses and individuals to accept Crypto-currency as payment, this leads to further adoption of the overall Crypto-currency ecosystem!
To facilitate the iOWN Ecosystem even further, the IN4X solution is integrated within the iOWN Wallet where there are added features to purchase Crypto-currency and use them as a form of payment to our merchant partners, and ecosystem platforms like iOWN Property.
Since the platform launched in Q4. The total value of crypto transactions through IN4X global reached over $500K. With our marketing strategy and future partnerships, we hope to drive the number of transactions in the long run!
As the company grew so did our team, we are always keen on hiring professional team members who will add value to the group. Almost every employee started a great adventure with iOWN group this year, we hired 17 new talents which totaled our team count to 27 across our Technical, Marketing and Operational departments. The increasing number of team members will allow us to focus on current projects and benefit from their rich experience.
At the same time, as the company is growing, we always put an emphasis on employee orientation and training. Training helps in combining ideas and showing how all our companies under the group integrate together. Our HR Department will review and create new employee guidelines to ensure smooth day-to-day activities of our growing team.
2021 was a year of achievements, we still have a lot more planned in 2022 including an upcoming roadmap. Our focus will be to scale iOWN Group across all business units in the market along with more integrations, partnerships and exchange listings. We look forward to what 2022 brings to all of us.