IntentX is proud to announce our leading role as an official SYMM Front-End Service Provider.
In November 2023, we announced our strategic partnership with SYMM to pioneer the evolution and future state of on-chain derivatives markets. This initiative is a big step forward to accomplishing our mission.
Our role as Front-End Service Provider will create great value to the ecosystem:
- SYMM IO: Higher quality and standard front-end partners. In turn attracting more users and market makers to the ecosystem (adoption).
- Front-End Partners: Low start up cost and whitelabel technical solution.
- Market Makers: Collectively larger market potential as front-end partners will bring more orderflow.
- IntentX: Becoming a core DeFi ‘infrastructure’ player, additional revenue streams to xINTX, maintaining status as a key SYMM Front-end.
This article delves into the nature of IntentX as a SYMM service provider, and the larger vision for IntentX as the Meta Front-End.
The Meta Front-End
With over $750M trade volume by 6000+ users to date, IntentX is the leading SYMMIO front-end in metrics such as daily trade volume, open interest, total users, daily active users, quotes and deposits.
Through extensive troubleshooting, feedback, and development efforts, IntentX has greatly advanced the AMFQ technology pioneered by SYMM to add advanced features such as:
- Advanced Trading Terminal Layout
- Enhanced Pair Search Functionality
- Liquidity Depth Chart
- Website Performance Upgrades
- Custom Slippage Settings and Position Closing Logic
- Upgraded Trade Notifications System
- Estimated Liquidation Prices
- Additional Solvency Indicators
- Advanced Account Analytics History
- Share Trade Cards
- Referrals System
- Trade to Earn System
- Leaderboard
- Mobile Interface and Progressive Web App (PWA Support)
- Much more!
With our significant investments into building the best possible trading experience, we envision IntentX as the “Meta Front-End”. Setting the standard and pushing the boundaries of what is possible as a SYMM front-end provider, while paving a path forward for the broader ecosystem.
While we will continue to spearhead technological advancements and adoption, we recognize opportunities to collaborate within the SYMM ecosystem to the mutual benefit of all.
The SYMM Front End Conundrum
As a decentralized infrastructure layer, SYMM is open to a network of front end providers each building their own solutions and ecosystems on top.
While a broad distribution bolsters the market penetration, decentralization, and network effects of SYMM, there are a number of challenges that emerge in the model.
- Front End Providers:
The Cloverfield base that SYMM has developed and provided is primitive and still in a “minimum viable product” state. This means considerable investment is required to bring this front-end up to industry standards and beyond.
Specifically in projects where SYMM perpetuals is not a primary product, they do not necessarily have the dedicated development resources to invest into building, maintaining, and then competing with incumbent FEs. This gap grows larger over time.
A DeFi project that might otherwise incorporate SYMM perps to diversify their offerings to their existing user base and add additional revenue streams has a significant barrier to adoption because of this.
Further, even if staffing the perpetuals platform with resources, it is entirely inefficient, if 20 front-ends each have 3 developers, that is 60 developers all building the same solution. These resources are better utilized building net new products.
2. SYMM Infrastructure:
Firstly, the SYMM system is highly dynamic, with many moving parts. While that results in superior scalability and robustness, it comes with a greater complexity than say an AMM style DEX. This means more surface area for things to go wrong, and a steeper learning curve to both users and FE providers.
With a growing front end network, the demands on SYMM to onboard and assist in supporting these FEs is very high. This is time and resources that SYMM can better spend on improving the back-end, SDKs, market maker onboarding, etc.
Secondly, with no “Meta-Front End”; standards for front-end providers will vary drastically across the board. A network of collaborating cutting edge front-ends would better serve the SYMM ecosystem in advancing adoption than a mix of varying (and lower) quality ones.
3. Market Makers:
Market makers are in the business of selling liquidity, and are singularly focused on facilitating the most trades possible. It is in the market makers’ best interests to have the highest quality front-end partners who are capable of attracting and retaining users to drive trade volume to them.
Increasing front-end quality accross the board will facilitate greater trade volumes, which in turn attracts more market makers who offer better products. This flywheel is important to achieve the full potential of SYMM.
4. IntentX:
Although IntentX is currently a leading front-end, there is still competition risk present from other providers, including a fragmentation of community.
Further, as a leading front end, we must advance developments the hard way. Through the arduous process of listening to feedback, responding to support tickets, and investing resources into figuring out the best way to address user issues. A new front-end coming on-board in the future will have the benefit of observing and copying our solutions with less effort.
So while IntentX can stay ahead of the curve on development, we can never entirely eliminate competition risk.
While game theory and prisoner’s dilemma would dictate that front-ends would naturally compete against one another to position themselves best, this would generally cause worse outcomes for the entire SYMM ecosystem.
IntentX as a service provider is taking a pro-active step forward to address key challenges for all parties in the ecosystem to push adoption forward.
The IntentX as a Service Provider
The solution IntentX has proposed and is pioneering is to be a common service provider to the ecosystem.
Through the SYMM approved “Service Provider” program, IntentX will collaborate with select partners to export and support a front end solution for their project. This will include the UX improvements made to date, technical + operational support, and ongoing updates.
Rather than competing amongst countless front-ends, we will collaborate to build the highest standard UX, propagate it far and wide, and share in the value created.
In exchange, IntentX will receive a variable share of revenues, with 10% of gross revenues from supported front-end partners flowing to xINTX stakers!
This program is targeted towards DeFi projects with existing userbases that are looking to introduce new products and diversify their revenue streams. It will allow for specialization, so those projects can focus on their core business and what they do best, and let IntentX focus on what we do best.
This would open SYMM distribution to new partners that might previously not have had the resourcing, knowledge, or specialization to operate their own front-end. Expanding our product to net new user bases and communities.
For the ecosystem this addresses key challenges for all players, including:
- Reducing support requirements from SYMM, allowing them to focus on core platform development and back-end tooling
- Expanding business development efforts to onboard more communities and users
- Allowing other front-ends the opportunity to participate in the development efforts from IntentX at a low cost
- Providing more orderflow and trading volume to market makers, which in turn, increases the potential for SYMM to attract bigger and better market makers with better offerings
- Allows IntentX to share in the growth of the broader ecosystem as a collaborator, not a competitor. With value accrual to xINTX
We are excited to start this program and journey, and look forward to sharing more details on our early adopter partners in the near future!
The Grand Vision
We are truly early to not only in the SYMM ecosystem but DeFi as a whole. The opportunity to collaborate and collectively contribute to the ecosystem to grow the pie as a whole is realized through this initiative.
Only 1% of perpetual volume currently trades on-chain, so there is no need to compete and cannibalize other FEs over this existing order flow. The SYMM ecosystem should fight the temptations to silo and rather work together to target the 99% share that is yet to be realized.
SYMM as a vision to be the derivatives settlement layer of the world has a self actualizing flywheel:
In the end state, this results in SYMM being a primary source of derivatives settlement, removing the need for hedging at CEX altogether. Enabling true decentralized and scalable derivatives markets on-chain.
Of course this is a chicken and egg situation, what comes first (supply or demand)? IntentX will help kick start this flywheel off with step #1, where we collaborate to create the best broadly distributed front end.
In Vitalik Buterin’s recent blog, “Make Ethereum Cyberpunk Again”, he masterfully brings us back to the core ethos of the technology stack we are building on:
“Cooperative mindset: even while competing, projects within the ecosystem cooperate on shared software libraries, research, security, community building and other areas that are commonly valuable to them. Projects try to be positive-sum, both with each other and with the wider world.”
With our Service Provider program, we aim to embody the values of the blockchain community and collaboratively advance the DeFi ecosystem.
Official Links:
- Website: https://intentx.io/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/IntentX_
- Discord: https://discord.gg/IntentX
