XNET: 2023 Cluster Updates

Summary

Builders have spoken, and we’ve listened.

Today we are proposing a change to the XNET cluster reward system: introducing tiers. Gold hexes will remain the highest priority because they have the highest monetization potential, and Silver hexes will be near the perimeter of Gold hexes. In addition to those changes, we propose an increase to token earnings across these two tiers. Finally, we are announcing a few new eligible clusters.

Silver and Gold

In addition to our carrier grade mobile core, clusters form the backbone of XNET. We believe this strategy is the only way to create high-quality 4G/5G footprint to enable XNET to fill in coverage & capacity gaps for Tier-One MNOs in select markets in the US.

Soon after the launch of XNET, a ton of people reached out requesting exceptions for nodes that were located just outside of high-value hexes. The proposal to create Silver hexes is our answer to these corner cases as well as a way to incentive a gradient approach to signal strength instead of a hard drop off outside of a Gold hex. With the creation of Gold and Silver hexes, we now have 4 total earning ranges:

• Gold hexes: highest reward and highest monetization potential.
• Silver hexes: moderate reward and moderate monetization potential.
• Eligible zip codes: metros where radios will earn baseline tokens only.
• Ineligible zip codes: radio deployed here will not receive any tokens.

Moreover, we are proposing an upward adjustment to the rewards across Silver and Gold hexes per epoch. The reason for doing this is simple: we want a deployment to be further derisked for builders. As we will detail later on, we at XNET are actually building several clusters too, so folks on the sidelines also have the option of waiting till a cluster is more fleshed out. Just don’t wait too long.

1. Includes any combination of radio paired with a Marconi gateway.
2. FW300i + Marconi is the earning potential of a “Bring Your Own” BlinQ FW300i paired with a Marconi gateway. Contact the XNET team for more information on high volume professional deployments.

The numbers above represent typical all-in token earnings for a given class and location, but those tokens come in several different forms: initial grants, as well as from coverage, validation and staking contributions. Compared with the previous system, this represents a 2~2.2x greater token allotment across all categories. Gold and Silver Hex incentives (if implemented) will start from the beginning of Epoch 7.

New Clusters

The XNET team has been hard at work identifying opportunities in more metro areas. To that end, we have rolled out a plan for three more eligible clusters in Dallas and Chicago.

Look for these Gold and Silver hexes on our explorer soon.

Token design philosophy

Any changes to the token always raises questions about design philosophy. To be perfectly clear: XNET is not a ‘front loaded, sprint deploy’ kind of network. We have geographically limited deployment areas, variable (not fixed) emission schedule, and 36–60 month insider lockup timelines with gradual release afterwards — all in stark contrast with Pollen and Helium. Look for much more detail on lockup schedule coming soon. We know from experience that too much speed hurts deployment quality, and without quality there is no customer. Success for XNET will be measured by revenue per radio from real world use.

XNET token supply will track overall utility and not be dictated by an arbitrary schedule. In contrast, front-loaded models involve heavy distribution of tokens at the outset, long before a single customer arrives. While early adopters may benefit in the short term, the long-term sustainability of the network is put at risk. In some cases, the network may need to implement hidden dilution measures just to keep operating, and in extreme cases, the network may not be able to survive at all.

That said, emissions per radio will go down as the network grows, and Gold hexes will fill up! Gold hexes will reach coverage capacity sooner than later. There are not infinite offload opportunities for XNET so there is not infinite opportunity to wait on the sideline. How do we know this? There are numerous Gold cluster projects in motion today, not to mention XNET is putting our money where our mouth is by building a few clusters ourselves. The offload vision is extremely compelling and we don’t mind leading the charge to make this point.

Creating a criteria for when a Gold hex fills up is not trivial. Internally we are refining a method we call Radio Density Index (RDI) which is based on radio types and population density: a Southern California beach town has much different density needs than Lower Manhattan. This idea is by no means complete today, and we would love input.

Request for input

The tiered hex and greater earnings proposal was in response to excellent comments made by community members, deployers and elsewhere. We would like to continue having a dialog about the ideas proposed here today. To that end, we would love to hear from you in our Discord, Twitter or during an AMA scheduled for Feb. 16th 2023.

Finally, we invite everybody to drop a comment or question on our more technical and detail rich internal working document called XNET Clusters and Hex Rewards. We’ll leave this document open for comments until Feb. 28th 2023.