Read Our New Project Report About Bitcoin (BTC) - The World's Largest Cryptocurrency
Go

logoFIO Protocol (FIO)

A Decentralized Usability Layer for Cryptocurrency Transactions.
  • FIO Protocol (FIO) is a decentralized blockchain protocol that aims to enable a better way of sending and receiving coins and tokens.
  • The FIO token is the native utility token of the project's blockchain infrastructure, FIO Chain, and is used for transaction gas fees and onchain governance.
  • FIO Chain is a Delegated Proof-of-Stake (DPoS) blockchain that is designed to manage the high data-write needs of the FIO Protocol. Block Producers (BP) do not collect block rewards, nor incur any token supply inflation. Instead, BPs only get rewards from transaction fees.
  • As of the time of writing, the project has launched:
    • FIO Address: allows users to initiate onchain transactions with intelligeble identifiers such as "tom@trustwallet" or "jack@ethereum";
    • FIO Requests: allows users to request funds from anyone using supported wallets, with in-app notifications and simple approvals;
    • FIO Data: allows encrypted metadata to be attached to any transaction.
  • 16.02% of total FIO token supply has been distributed to equity investors, while 1.41% of the total FIO token supply were sold via private token sales. FIO protocol raised a total of 6.27MM USD from equity and private token sales.

1. What is FIO Protocol (FIO)?

The FIO Protocol is a decentralized usability layer that connects crypto wallets, exchanges, payment processors, and any other application in which crypto assets are held or transferred.

The project aims to make the user experience of interacting with all blockchains easier, less complicated and risky, and therefore reducing user friction.

Some of its key highlights include:

  • Human-meaningful: allows users to initiate transactions using intelligeble identifiers such as "tom@trustwallet" or "jack@ethereum".
  • Decentralized: powered by a public blockchain that does not require a centralized solution of a trusted third party.
  • Secure: all FIO Protocol transactions require a FIO private key, which is controlled by the user herself.
  • Private: sensitive information such as public addresses and metadata can be encrypted on the blockchain.
  • Interoperable: once integrated into a wallet, the FIO Protocol works with any blockchain and cryptocurrency without any integration to those chains.
  • eCommerce-ready: enables request for payment functionality along with private metadata for every transaction.

1.1 Recent news

2. Existing products and technical infrastructure

2.1 Existing products

FIO Address acts as the human-readable wallet identifier for users on the FIO Protocol. It is necessary for users to utilize all the capabilities of the FIO Protocol, but also serve as a replacement for complicated public addresses across all tokens and coins in users' wallets.

FIO Addresses have the construct of username@domain. Examples of a FIO Address would be: "tom@trustwallet" or jack@ethereum".

The registration of a FIO Address can done directly through an application that has integrated the FIO Protocol, or through a hosted registration site that is open to the community. Applications and service providers who have already integrated with the FIO Protocol can be found here.

The FIO Addresses and all subsequent interactions with the FIO Protocol are controlled by FIO private keys owned by users themselves.

A FIO Address has a default yearly fee in FIO tokens, and is bonded with 100 free transactions.

If a user has used all of her free transaction quota before the next year, she could choose to renew her yearly subscription early with another FIO token payment, or to pay transactions individually going forward. If the renewal fee for a FIO Address is not paid by its expiration date, the address will be temporarily disabled.

FIO Request allows a user to initiate a transaction in which a payee is requesting funds from a payer using FIO Addresses. This request is stored onchain, and all sensitive metadata such as currency, amount, public address of payee, FIO Data, etc., is encrypted using the Diffie-Hellman key exchange.

The payer's wallet or application communicates with the FIO Chain for relevant FIO Requests, and decrypts the request inside her wallet. The payer can choose whether to approve or reject the requests.

FIO Data is metadata that can accompany any blockchain transaction. This metadata can range from a simple memo (e.g., "for lunch"), to structured data like an order cart, exchange deposit details, or hashes that refer to off-chain data. FIO Data can be used to support decentralized commerce, in which conventional transaction information such as invoices, dates, and contact information can be stored on-chain for future audits.

FIO Data can also include metadata related to a native blockchain transaction, such as transaction ids, refund addresses, and hashes of off-chain data.

2.2 Technical Infrastructure

The FIO Chain is utilizing Delegated Proof-of-Stake (DPoS) to achieve network consensus. Block Producers (BPs) are chosen by users who hold FIO tokens via onchain voting. Anyone can register to become a BP and produce blocks if they receive enough votes.

Voting will be conducted after every epoch, or 126 blocks, and 21 active BPs and 21 standby BPs will be selected. For each block, 40% of the fees collected will be split evenly amongst the 21 active BPs, while 60% of the fees will be distributed to all active and standby BPs proportionally, according to how many votes each BP receives.

Blocks are produced exactly every 0.5 seconds. During each epoch, the 21 active BPs will each produce 6 blocks. BPs can modify system settings and smart contracts with ⅔ + 1 (at least 15 BPs) supermajority.

Every interaction with the FIO blockchain can be tagged with an optional Technology Provider ID (TPID), a type of FIO Address. When such a transaction is submitted, the tagged FIO Address will receive a portion of fees collected. This feature is made to increase the adoption of the FIO Protocol among existing blockchain ecosystem participants.

3. Economics and supply

Token allocation

Token NameFIO
Equity Investors16.42% of total token supply
Private Sale 10.04% of total token supply
Private Sale 20.04% of total token supply
Private Sale 31.33% of total token supply
Team17.53% of total token supply
Advisors1.05% of total token supply
Foundation22.01% of total token supply
Foundation Service Provider0.32% of total token supply
Future Token Sales Reserve3.59% of total token supply
Bounties12.50% of total token supply
Integration Incentives11.39% of total token supply
FIO Address Giveaway12.50% of total token supply
Block Producer Incentives1.00% of total token supply
Airdrop0.28% of total token supply

Token sales data

Token NameFIO
Private Sale 1 Price0.0500 USD / FIO
Private Sale 1 Allocation400,000 FIO
Private Sale 1 Amount Raised20,000 USD (20,000 USDT)
Private Sale 2 Price0.1200 USD / FIO
Private Sale 2 Allocation400,000 FIO
Private Sale 2 Amount Raised48,000 USD
Private Sale 3 Price0.0375 USD / FIO
Private Sale 3 Allocation13,333,333 FIO
Private Sale 3 Amount Raised500,000 USD

16.02% of total FIO token supply has been distributed to equity investors. FIO protocol raised a total of 6.27MM USD from equity and private token sales.

FIO token distribution (%)

3.3 Token governance and use of funds

As of writing, FIO Protocol has used approximately 76.00% of funds raised according to the allocations below:

  • 60.90% Protocol Development.
  • 15.20% Business Development and End User Marketing.
  • 8.10% Legal.
  • 15.80% Administrative.
FIO token release schedule

The following chart represents the number and breakdown of all FIO tokens that are to be released into circulation on a monthly basis. Bounties and FIO Address Giveaway tokens will continue to be released after October 2024.

3.4 FIO token overview and use-cases

The FIO token is used primarily for:

  • Address and domain registration fees
  • Transaction fees
  • Block Producer voting

4. Project team

Dapix is a service provider to the Foundation, and has built the first version of the FIO Protocol.

Luke Stokes
Foundation Managing Director
Launch Team Member of eosDAC, Witness of the Hive Blochchain, co-founder and former CTO of FoxyCart.com.
Paul Puey
Foundation Director
Co-founder and CEO of Edge Wallet, former Owner of Hangtime Climbing Company and 3D Software Developer at NVIDIA.
Brent Traidman
Foundation Director
SVP of Global Sales at Bread, former VP of Sales at Astute Solutions and Cvent.
George Kimionis
Foundation Director
Foudner and CEO of Coinomi Wallet, Founder of Cryptean, Founder and former CEO of BetKernel.
Glenn Kennedy
Foundation Director
Partner at Paradigm Partners.
Rami James
Foundation Director
Product Owner at Ultra, COO at GetScatter, former Software Developer at Qmarkets.
Hahn Ryu
Foundation Director
Founder and CEO of NodeONE, Advisor at Uncloak, former Global BD Manager at D.CAMP.
David Gold
CEO of Dapix
Co-founder and CEO of Dapix, Director at Rockie Venture Club, Founder and former Chairman of Colorado Venture Summit.
Pawel Mastalerz
CPO of Dapix
Co-founder and CPO of Dapix, President at Blue T Group, former CPO at SPENT.
Eric Butz
VP of Engineering at Dapix
Former Software Development Director at Oracle, VP of Engineering at Decisioneering.
Jonathan Syu
Director of Marketing at Dapix
Former Digital Marketing Specialist at CSG International, Senior Technology Manager at Carbon8 Marketing.
Edward Rotthoff
Director of Architecture at Dapix
Former Software Engineer at Mingle Analytics, Senior Director of Research at Biodesix.
Todd Garrison
Director of Security at Dapix
Former Security Engineer at CipherTrace, Enterprise Security Specialist at Janus Henderson Investors.
Adam Androulidakis
Senior Blockchain Engineer at Dapix
Former freelance Blockchain Developer, Software Enigneer at Computer Concepts.
Casey Gardiner
Senior Blockchain Engineer at Dapix
Former Technical Advisor at Blockbid, Software Engineer at Upwork.

5. Roadmap, updates, and business development

5.1 Original roadmap and achievements

DateMilestoneCommentary
2018: Q4Launch of the Foundation for Interwallet OperabilityMedium
2018: Q4Launch of product integration alphaMedium
2019: Q3Launch of FIO Address pre-saleMedium
2019: Q4Launch of FIO Chain testnetMedium
2020: Q1Release of core protocol functionalitiesMedium

5.2 Updated roadmap

The current list of FIO Improvements Proposals (FIPs) can be found here.

2020 Q3

  • Release of new fee computations.
  • Release of API paging improvements.

2020 Q4

  • Release of token burn functionalities.
  • Allowing voting and proxying without a FIO Address.

5.3 Commercial partnerships and business development progress

The FIO Ecosystem consists of wallets, exchanges, applications, tools, crypto payments processors, and other supporters of the FIO Protocol. A full list of the members of the FIO Ecosystem can be found here.

6. FIO Protocol's activity and community overview

6.1 Development activity

6.2 Social and community activity

Strategy overview

FIO Protocol will initially focus its community development efforts in North America and Europe, and will gradually expand to other regions as the project grows.

Current community growth strategies of FIO Protocol include:

  • Building an extensive worker proposal system and reputation system to incentivize community contribution.
  • Providing consistent updates on all of FIO Protocol’s activities.
  • Developing an extensive online knowledge base.
  • Conducting joint campaigns with FIO Ecosystem partners.
  • Attracting users with the onchain referral system.
  • Launching various giveaway and airdrop campaigns with key ecosystem participants.

Future community growth strategies of FIO Protocol include:

  • Providing more tools to community members to create and manage international communities
  • Launching grants, bounties and service contracts.
  • Reaching out to more companies for potential partnerships.

Community and social channels (Data as of August 11th 2020)

Twitter (English) | 52.0K Followers
Telegram (English) | 14.6K Members
Reddit (English) | 130 Members
Facebook (English) | 250 Followers
Discord (English) | 853 Members
Blog (English)

7. Appendix

Documents

Advisors