The global e-commerce market is forecast to exceed $4 trillion by 2020, up from $2.29 trillion in sales currently, according to Statista. Blockchain technology has the potential to rev up the process since the crypto market capitalization reached almost $700 billion this year and may rise to $2 trillion by 2020, according to Marketwatch research.
Given all this, it’s no surprise that there is an exponentially growing demand for platforms designed to simplify interaction with blockchain protocols and cryptocurrency payments for e-commerce users.
The Plaza project focuses on utility, convenience, efficiency, and security to make distributed ledger technology (DLT) suitable for building commercial applications by eliminating six critical hurdles that prevent it from being used on a daily basis.
The stumbling blocks for DLT are:
1) Speed: Currently, the Bitcoin blockchain can process less than three transactions per second (tps), as seen on blockchain.info. Ethereum has an estimated rate of 20 tps, which is still painfully slow for everyday purposes and paling in comparison to Visa's 1,600+ tps. Plaza Systems' MerchantChain can beat them all with 15,000 tps.
"Our FSDLT (File System Distributed Ledger Technology) solution runs on mDHT (mainline Distributed Hash Table) networks, which ensures that transactions can be processed in parallel," explains Ronald Aai, CTO of SQ2 Fintech, Plaza Systems' associate company.
2) Cost: Bitcoin transaction fees may seem like too much, but no one will want to buy a cup of coffee with 10% commission provided that a credit card purchase is free of charge. MerchantChain's proof-of-reputation (POR) protocol allows transactions to be confirmed in real time and eliminates the "auction-like" pricing system, ensuring low fees and fair rewards for miners.
3) Trust and Reputation: Anonymity is a good thing, but it has a nasty side effect. Buyers and sellers distrust each other, which makes mainstream e-commerce on the blockchain impossible. The high risk of fraud and illegal activities makes stakeholders suspicious and instigates a tighter regulatory approach. MerchantChain solves the issue with the AURA SSL Certificate, which every buyer and seller must have.
"It's basically an anti-money-laundering (AML) and know-your-customer (KYC) process which helps buyers trust sellers and sellers trust buyers," Aai explains.
4) Sustainability: The Bitcoin and Ethereum blockchains are built on proof-of-work concepts, where miners need to be the first to solve a mathematical problem. This approach has triggered a race for high-powered and thus electricity-intensive equipment. Currently, Bitcoin mining accounts for 0.26% of global demand for energy, which is as much as Kuwait, according to the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index.
MerchantChain’s ledger is not that power-hungry as it can be maintained by Internet of Things (IoT) devices with a low level of energy consumption as well as Plaza’s mobile & desktop applications. Every user therefore helps to maintain the ledger and receives royalties.
5) Volatility: Digital assets are notoriously volatile, which makes them useless in everyday operations. Buyers are loath to spend their coins as they expect them to become far more valuable in the future. Remember the story about the guy who bought two pizzas for 10,000 Bitcoins in 2010? This is over $75 million at the current exchange rate!
Sellers are also wary because cryptocurrencies can depreciate quickly, leaving them at a loss. The Plaza project has its own coin to solve this problem. MerchantChain Transaction Coin (MTC) is backed by real value and designed for spending, with characteristics that make it a stable and reliable medium of exchange.
6) Difficulty: Less technically-savvy users find it hard to grasp the concept of blocks, hashes, and computation power. They don't want to bother with all that stuff. That's why Plaza has created the Freedom Lifestyle - a suite of user-friendly tools for product search and payment that interact with the MerchantChain via the multi-crypto PlazaWallet.
"At the center of our Freedom Lifestyle consumer solution is an AI-assisted metasearch engine that will scour the world wide web for the best options on goods and services, including those offered by sellers marketing directly on our own blockchain-based e-commerce platform,” comments Kevin Johnson, the CEO and chief architect of Plaza.
"The algorithm will never bias products offered in our marketplace. It won't have to. In terms of price, products offered on our marketplace are likely to be highly competitive because, unlike paying with fiat on established e-commerce sites, there are virtually zero transaction costs when paying with our transaction coin. It's our way of keeping the marketplace honest!"
Plaza System ICO details
The pre-sale stage of Plaza System’s crowdsale is live until April 12, while the main token generation event (TGE) is scheduled to run from April 26 to June 7. The project plans to raise 100,000 ETH, which is deemed enough to finish the product and take it to the market. Early comers are entitled to PLAZA token bonuses of up to 30%.
PLAZA tokens have many important uses, the most important being access to the MerchantChain to build or plug in decentralised applications for shopping, trade, or any commercial activity.
If you are interested in the Plaza ICO, you can visit the official website or follow it on Twitter and Telegram.
This article appeared first on Cryptovest
