Thanks to everyone who joined us this week for an AMA with our senior team Oliver Xie, Sum Wei, and Dan Thomson. For those who missed it, we’re happy to provide the recap here.
DAN THOMSON
Hi everyone and welcome to today’s AMA.
I’m Dan, the CMO at InsurAce, and today we have Oliver (@insurance4web3) our CEO and Sum, our CTO joining the AMA to answer any questions you may have.
I’ll give a bit of an update to begin with, followed up with some pre-submitted questions, and then we’ll get onto your questions.
DAN THOMSON
Welcome guys
Oliver
Thanks Dan.
Hi everyone, Oliver here.
Sum
Hey guys, Sum here.
DAN THOMSON
To kick off, let’s give some updates on recent activitiy at InsurAce.
It was a tricky couple of months following the UST payout as we put our heads down to build and update systems and policy wording.
Since we’ve gone live we’ve seen sales start to come in again, understandably slower than before UST but building up again.
Recently we added more capacity for most of our protocols and have begun to focus more on community activiites to help build engagement and encourage sales and new investors to get on board
Our core team at InsurAce is unchanged, we’ve had some new people join the team recently to help improve the quality and consistency of content being released. So you should all start to see a lot more defi cover topics in our blog too
We’ve been featured in CoinTelegraph 3 times in the last two months. With a fourth coming in the next few days.
This has also gained us a good amount of media attention across the industry too, which in turn has led to new opportunities and partnerships
Finally, we’re working hard to continue to bring V2 updates including our tokenomics, cover marketplace, and investment arm.
We have some new products in the pipeline like bridge insurance as well as several new stablecoin products and more smart contract covers for exciting new protocols.
Oh, and next week concludes the BNB Chain MVB V program. Unfortunately we were not selected for investment round at this time. However, that does not mean that we have been completely overlooked. We are actually working very closely with BNB chain on our v2 tokenomics which will be a big help to all new and future investors.
Upcoming events include –
Mainnet 2022
InsurTech Vegas
Singapore Token 2049
GlobalLink by transperfect
Africa Blockchain & DeFi week (Accra)
DevCon Bogota
Eth lisbon
WOW summit Lisbon
Solana Breakpoint.
Be sure to get in touch if you’ll be at these too.
Enough of me rambling on. Let’s get into some questions
We’ve had a few questions submitted in advance, so we’ll start with those before moving onto community questions.
1. How much runway does the protocol have? Any plans to bolster the treasury if more runway is needed for a prolonged bear?
Oliver:
The project team still has about 12 months of runway based on the current burning rate with proceeds raised from previous investors. As the market went bearish, we also tightened the cost accordingly, which gave us more runway.
We’re also planning for new fundraising rounds (potentially in equity), to source more proceeds to support the development of the project and operation of the team, and we have attracted the interests of a number of investors as they have seen our work so far and the past revenue capability of the protocol.
One of the big challenges of the bear market is its impact on the token price, as the market cap has shrunk so much, fundraising in tokens has become more challenging than before.
This project was started in Sept 2020, and it has survived for 2 years, which is so much longer than the average lifespan of crypto projects in general (3-6months). With a solid and hardworking team, great support from the community, and the growing web3 ecosystem, I’m still confident about the survival and development of the protocol.
DAN:
Great, I’m sure lots of people will be very happy to hear that. We’re all still here, getting stronger as we go.
2. Are there plans to revise the revenue/coverage targets on the roadmap given things are off of that projection?
DAN:
Yes, the roadmap we released was adapted from one that we were building just before the UST and was released in a way that was not representative of where we were at the time it came out. That was on me and I apologise for the misleading information. The targets will be adjusted and roadmap updated. A lot of the technical parts of the roadmap however are still looking very likely to be accurate and released at the right times.
3. How is the MVB V program going and any updates on that?
DAN:
Again, this one was more for me. I touched on it earlier. I think that the MVB program has been great for us. It’s been super interesting with great speakers and a great group of projects. We were not selected for the final 7 to go through to investment talks but given the sta,ge we are at (much further along than the others) it was not right for us or Binance labs at this time. However, we have identified the opportunity here and are working closely with BNB chain to update our tokenomics and are in constant contact with Binance and Binance labs. all of which is extremely positive and will hopefully lead to a listing one day.
4. Is there something the community can help with?
I think this is an important question, and yes the community can definitely get involved more to help out on many fronts. @insurance4web3, what do you think?
Oliver:
Yes, for sure.
As one of our focus is to launch and revise the governance structure, that’s the part we would seek help most from our dear community, claims will also be part of the governance.
Recently, we’ve been working with a big insurance group on some joint consultation and research on the governance of the insurance business, that’s more important than we used to think, especially for insu for the insurance context.
But as always, we welcome all sorts of discussions and feedback anytime.
DAN:
Agreed, I think that all ideas are always welcome and heard. They are passed on to the team and implemented. So feel free to contribute ideas here or on our discord anytime. I’ll end up reading them personally so they’re being seen by the core team for sure.
5. any significant movement on bringing in Tradfi insurers into the fold?
This is an interesting one. Yes, we are very close to making this a reality. However, instead of rushing it through and potentially being stuck with a third-party intermediary, we are exploring how we can do this more directly, which will feed directly into the profitability of the protocol.
We believe we are still the furthest protocol along in terms of making this integration a reality, and so have a bit of breathing space to ensure we go with the right option.
Bit of background context on this.
As you all know, one of the biggest challenges for us and all other defi insurance players is the capacity issue – huge demand for insurance, but insufficient supply.
We’re seeking capacity sources from the TradFi insurers, to work together covering the web3 risks.
6. How do you plan on scaling dozens of chains in the long run?
Sum:
It’s a good question, my responses are from different dimensions…
1. New Governance Hierarchy – improve governance efficiency, streamline ops flow, reduce maintenance efforts, more community engagement.
2. Marketplace – allow more protocols to be listed and more product risk types to be covered.
3. New Tokenomics – sustainable token flow for multi-chain strategy
4. Enhanced Infra – Bridge + MultiChain aggregator, to support cross-chain information sharing
These are high-level briefings, we will have our docs ready and share them with the community in a phased manner, any comments or suggestion is welcome.
DAN:
Nice, we’ve touched on a few of these before, but good to see there is even more there in the pipeline.
Last one of the pre-submitted Qs.
7. Have you considered implementing recurring subscriptions in some manner?
DAN:
It’s something we’ve talked about before a lot internally and with the community, so what are the issues around deploying this type of update to the system?
Sum
Yes, we’ve discussed the cover auto renew feature and this is in our roadmap backlog, would focus on V2 full feature release first then revisit this, but can re-prioritize if there is strong business impact.
There indeed are lots of things we want to do and plan to do, still, need to well design and planned, bcoz we’ve march from 2020 Q4 till now, it’s not an easy trip I would say, but lots of exciting thing are waiting and achievable in the coming future.
DAN:
I agree, and the industry has evolved a lot in that time so focusing on certain tasks can change rapidly with changing ecosystems
7. Is there an accurate month for the implementation of the new economics?
DAN:
It’s still scheduled for Q4. So, by the end of the year. We’re quite far along and have had the help of BNB Chain recently to check over them and help us to improve them
Thank you
8. Hi guys i made it! Thanks again for having this AMA. Great to hear from all of you. this one is from NeoTokyo who could not be here: I would like to see the financials of Insurace. Things like yearly revenue, yearly profit, assets, liabilities, etc. Is that something that the DAO provides right now?
Oliver
Thanks,
Most of the operational data on the insurance business is here on our website: https://data.insurace.io/cover
including liabilities, GWP, assets, etc. from an insurance business perspective.
But of course, all these are in quite a raw format, and need some consolidation if NeoTokyo needs it. But the fastest way is to check the data from here.
9. Top exchanges will be listed in the fourth quarter. Why the delay?
Oliver:
Another reason why this was delayed, is because of the recent tightening regulations to DeFi after the market collapse in the past few months.
I’ve seen many Defi projects start to be more careful with the tokenomics, to avoid being identified as capital market products such as security. Honestly, we’ve been working with law firms on this too, that’s also why some very fancy features were being scrutinized again. This really takes time.
My observation is that regulations on DeFi will be harsher in the coming years, if not in months. We must take a more prudent attitude to this.
10. Are you trying to raise the price of tokens? If you are, how will you proceed?
DAN:
With the new tokenomics there will be a lot of new interest, and it will help to slow down the selling pressure that we have with current tokenomics.
So, with that, we can list onto other exchanges to open up the market without having to worry about the token value decreasing further. So yes, Q4, or just after.
We’re not trying to artificially pump the price through shilling and other techniques that don’t add real value.
Perhaps Mr.Sum can shed some light on how the v2 tokenomics will add value to holders
Sum.
We introduce something new in our v2 tokenomics, including token buyback, “bribe,and gauge” this will directly or indirectly create a sustainable loop for InsurAce Ecosystem, as Oliver mentioned earlier, we also work with legal and compliance officers on this topic to ensure it’s fair and open.
Oliver
I know the token price has been very frustrating so far, and I hate it too. But tbh, it’s a systematic thing to build up the price.
Our idea has always been that token is the medium to capture the value of the protocol, but first of all, the protocol has to create values, and that’s why we put more focus on products and sales.
Because that’s the way to the value of the tokens. And it’s funny now this has been given a new name, called “Real Yield”.
DAN
But with that we understand that the community want the token price to go up, as we all do. We’re all holders too.
Jokie
on the equity raise question – i am glad new fundraising is being considered but i do worry that the token becomes worthless if it is superceded by equity as that is a very legally defined asset. and thst interests between the two groups can eventually diverge in favor of the equity holders and at the expense of token holders who have been investing. i think a token raise would keep everyone most aligned even if that means raising the cap. (though preferably from existing treasury). perhaps there are other option as well, but my initial thoughts on an equity raise
Oliver
Yes, I know your concerns on this. It’s like dYdX has a dual structure – tokens + equities, where the values are accrued more to the equity holders, which is quite controversial. People may ask: what is the point of having the token?
this is not the “equity” as I mean.
As we’re discussing this in a bear market context about runway and survival of the project, this is more on how the team can sustain.
that “equity” means how to capture the value of the project team that develops the protocol. So, in the long run, there might be some service fees flowing into the team who develops this protocol, but the majority of the revenue still flows to the token holders. that equity is targeted for investors to capture the value of the team instead of direct combating the token holders.
This structure has been adopted by many other teams and protocols too.
So, at the protocol level, it’ll only be token holders, and they can govern to decide how much service fees given to the team in the future. This will not dilute the value of the existing token holders.
Jokie
Got it that makes sense. Thanks for the clarification, and thanks again to you and MrS for joining us today. really great to hear from you guys and that the team is doing well!
pooii
I saw the listing proposal of the Korea bithumb exchange last time, is it really related to the exchange? I wonder if you have any plans to go listing
Dan:
its hard to separate real proposals from fake ones. Bithumb is on our list to get listed onto, however again, after v2 tokenomics come out
But the way we are building is for long-term sustainable value, and Real Yield as Oliver says, instead of quick pumps
Hopefully that answers everyone’s questions.
We’ll end the AMA there, if anyone has any further questions, please feel free to message us and we’ll do our best to reply.
Thanks to Sum, and Oliver for taking time out of their busy day today to answer questions.
