Ten questions asking the founders of Bizkey: Are they on the right track to the offline payment of digital money?

October 10, 2018 is the autumn of Beijing, but it is the winter of the whole block chain industry. Everyone in the block chain industry is trembling. From the collective dive of mainstream currencies to the strict regulation of policies and regulations, it seems that we are only left to talk about gossip. Despite all the zeroing irony, there are still some who insist that winter is the best time to do a real project. In the afternoon, Bizkey, a popular offline payment project in August, held a small product launch in 798. Bizkey, together with Bank of Hash Power and Bixin, launched a series of products and services, such as Block Chain Intelligent Pos Machine, Open Platform, Accounting Financial Products, Digital Money Security Trusteeship, etc.

Although the coin circle is one day, the world is one year, but we still remember the past July and August. Mixed with various “X change” nouns, it is almost a night in a variety of styles suddenly appeared in this industry. It was in those two months that Bizkey came into sight. Within a short period of time, Bizkey changed from controversial currency №1 project to queue jumping and then quit. During that time, Bizkey and its related news were seen almost daily, and its Weixin index soared to nearly 40,000. From time to time, Scarlett, the co-founder and COO of Bizkey, came to mind and said many witty quotes to the media. The seemingly less serious statements of “the shortest announcement in history,” “annoying the midnight announcement,” “the team needs sleep” were inconsistent with the coin circle/chain circle of the time. But also because of her forthright, let us expect this Bizkey conference.

To be honest, although payment is generally recognized as the closest destination for the block chain industry, currently the number of users of encrypted currency holdings is small, and most of them are speculators. As a conviction that digital money is heading for life, I still have a lot of doubts even after the release of Bizkey’s sparkling array of products. Although the ideal is sexy, the reality is very abnormal. Even if I put aside technical aspects such as network efficiency and user experience, I worry about how the project will actually land. What did Bizkey do in the two months after he announced his withdrawal? Have they made progress in their plans? How can such a small industry be accepted by the general public? How to embody entity merchants? With a lot of misgivings, we had more than three hours of in-depth communication with Bizkey co-founder and COO, Scarlett, in the afternoon of October 13, in conjunction with mainstream media. Scarlett, representing the project, revealed the team’s confidence in the same way: “Many people see the goal in front of them, but only Bizkey knows clearly what the road should be. “

Question 1: Please tell us again about the Bizkey project.

[Scarlett] Bizkey is committed to creating an offline payment entry for digital currencies to provide a broad offline payment scenario for a variety of digital currencies. Our vision is to dock more than 1 million offline physical retailers within three years, making it possible for digital money payments to enter public life.

We reach the ambitious goal through three steps:

Step 1: At this stage when digital money has not been widely held and recognized, we can quickly expand merchants through the way that physical retailers can get data assets token reward by desensitizing and linking the data of fiat transactions. Compared with centralized platform, Bizkey not only does not interfere with merchants’original local currency earnings, but also returns ownership and value of data assets to real merchants, allowing merchants to join ecology faster.

The second step: empowering the real economy to help businesses achieve fast and effective cross drainage. At the same time, it helps entities businesses to provide support in many aspects such as financing and supply chain. Continue to maintain the viscosity between merchants. Let Bizkey’s token be fully utilized and flowed in the daily business of customers, thereby continuing to educate merchants and customers about digital money and block chains.

Third step: with the continuous access of merchants, the number of users will continue to increase. Bizkey will access more mainstream digital currencies, enabling them to have massive offline payment scenarios. Bizkey will collect these digital currency transaction fees, business digital currency storage and settlement and other benefits.

Payment is the closest sector to the floor of the block chain, and Bizkey will dock a large number of off-line physical merchants for the entire block chain industry. In the future, if any project wants to land, it will be right to find Bizkey.

[Question 2]: Bizkey has been out of sight for a while. What’s the team up to? What progress has been made? After two months, please give us a brief introduction.

Scarlett: in the past two months, our team has been busy with these 3 things. First, we landed on CMC’s fifth ranked DigiFinex Exchange. There are many interesting stories going on, such as successfully dodging the worst ETH price crash since the team was founded. For example, suffered from some counterfeit coins of the same name which were maliciously put on the line in advance by the same industry organizations, but refused to admit them. For example, on the opening day, when hostile competition took place, we planted leeks instead of cutting leeks (cash repurchases for the balance of all trading users). The price is good and relatively stable. Compared to the zero jump project, we are able to afford everyone’s love.

Second, our team continued to go all out to promote the commercial landing. Targeted at the Token Day in Singapore on October 31, we not only completed a large number of signatures from Singapore merchants, but also cooperated with Indonesia, Taiwan, South Korea and other platforms with a large number of merchant resources, and began docking systems. Our team ushered in an important puzzle. Lin Qiaoli, the former COO of Enjoy, a quality of life platform in mainland China, has joined the team as one of the core members. Presumably, with her participation, we will go faster in business landing.

Third, over the past two months, our technical team has spent a lot of time building open platforms, developing products and docking channels. This is what we saw in the product launch conference the other day.

[Question three] Talk back to the topic. Bizkey aims to establish an offline payment entry for encrypted digital currencies. But not only me, but many others are wondering about it. First of all, currently the number of users holding money is very small, with fewer people using digital money for daily consumption payments, merchants will be difficult to accept it. In addition, for the mainstream encryption currency headed by Bitcoin and Ethereum, the network efficiency problem seriously affects the flow of the payment process. At the same time, there are potential security problems of funds, which will make merchants more afraid. Therefore, many people feel that the timing of digital money payment is not yet available.

[Scarlett] I think the premise of this problem is the fundamental problem of the encrypted digital money industry. In fact, there is no need for much discussion. It depends on the perspective of things. The former is looking at the future from the perspective of the present, while the latter is looking at the present from the perspective of the future. There are always two kinds of people in the world who can never reach a consensus, so we don’t have to start explaining such a complicated philosophical problem.

Of course we belong to the latter. The team admired Armstrong, the founder of CoinBase. He recently said that within five years there will be more than one billion digital money holders, and that digital money will appear in all aspects of people’s lives. The Bizkey team and many of our partners have witnessed Fiat mobile payment from scratch for just three years. From mainland China to Southeast Asia, to Japan and Korea and Europe, as long as there are places where Chinese people live, there are WeChat payments and Alipay. How many people could believe in cashless society three years ago? Therefore, we have reasons to believe that encrypting digital money into life is inevitable. As for technical problems, do you still want to use them? Time is enough. This industry brings together so many top talents that they will naturally fulfill their mission. And it won’t take much time. At present, many more efficient public chains have emerged. Bizkey will continue to connect them.

With the recognition of this trend, we can discuss second issues. I agree with you very much. This is the reality. We have to face it and never escape it. From the user’s point of view, there are only 40 million currencies holders in the world at present. How many real users are there, let alone the vast majority of real users, who really only regard it as an asset speculation and are not willing to use it in daily life. According to Bitmap, there are only 14,000 merchants worldwide who accept Bitcoin payments. Although it has turned over a hundred times over the past few years, the two sides of the transaction are still very inconsistent. This means that the proportion of digital money payments that occur in everyday life will be very low, and it is very valuable for a single merchant to have one occasionally.

Looking back at 15 years of WeChat payment, the acceptance rate of merchants was very low at that time. But let’s not forget that the red envelope campaign at the Spring Festival Gala in 2015 made almost all Chinese people have “money” in their Weixin wallets. The cost of education for merchants and users seems to be much lower than the current digital money payment. However, Bizkey and many mobile payment partners were deeply aware of that. Even if we promote a national application, it will be very difficult at the beginning. Before and after the Spring Festival in 2015, the proportion of payments under WeChat and Alipay online was less than 2%. The main difficulty is to keep in touch with customers and keep telling them that mobile payment is safe, fast and economical. In addition to paying, merchants need to give them a lot of extra free tools. All these require us to keep in touch with businesses. The more contact, the higher the frequency, the easier it is to succeed.

In order to persuade merchants to accept digital money payment, high-frequency contact is even more important. After all, the names of Bitcoin and Ethereum often represent issues of too much volatility or security, coupled with the pernicious effects of occasional pyramid or air coins, making it hundreds of times harder for merchants to accept digital money payments than it was to promote Wechat at first. But Bizkey knows exactly how to do it.

[Question four] there are many offline payment items in digital currency, such as Pundix. Pundix has had a good time recently. In a bad situation, it has not only been rising steadily, but has also been closely watched over by currency security. It has been said that it has recently received more than ten million dollars in financing. Bizkey certainly knows very well that you said it’s very difficult to promote digital money payments to merchants at this stage, but they’ve come up with the excellent results of adding more than 5,000 blockchain smart POS machines a month. How do you think they did it?

[Scarlett] Although we respect our colleagues very much, we respect the fact more. The exaggeration of the block chain industry is best to be as realistic as possible under this background. (reporter: do you mean that the data they provide is problematic?) After all, they are all working hard for the development of this industry. We highly respect the efforts of peers. We prefer to believe that their data have been true. Give a smart POS machine to a merchant free of charge, and if this is successful, it’s only true that the POS machine was once authentic on its first day. It is a long process from giving business to activating, then to daily high frequency use. Now who dares stand up and say that the POS machines they send out have more than a single digital currency payment transaction every day? I don’t think so. Send, that’s all the same. If you want to sell hundreds of dollars to a merchant, how difficult is it? The reasons for this are fully discussed when we discuss second issues. To this end, the team needs to maintain high-frequency contact with merchants, it needs to pay a lot of manpower, material and financial resources, and the current estimate is only lying in the store manager’s locker in a once-used machine.

Bizkey has extensive experience in promotion. Many block chain teams are relatively weak in business promotion, though most of them have technical backgrounds. We are well aware that the cost of education is very high if we simply promote digital money payment to merchants in the real world. Even if education is successful, it will take too much manpower to maintain continuing education.

The first advantage of Bizkey over its peers is that we use the high-frequency Fiat payment process of merchants to establish channels for high-frequency communication with merchants. Everyone knows that the highest frequency and the only indispensable link in the business process is payment. At this stage, of course, it is the Fiat’s payment link. Businessmen can get a corresponding amount of BZKY token rewards for each Fiat payment process by desensitizing the transaction data onto the chain. This means, first of all, that the cost of educating business people for the first time is very low, and the success rate is very high. Because Bizkey does not affect the Fiat revenue of merchants, and does not even affect the operation habits of merchants. Secondly, we have established contacts with merchants after every normal practice of cash collection. This connection is more convenient in the Chinese region where mobile payment is prevalent. As long as the merchant receives a sum of money, we can exert an impact on the merchants in the mining return page. Not only can we keep telling merchants how much Fiat they’ve earned, we can also tell them how much Fiat they’ve received for BZKY. Once or twice, in the long run, we can educate merchants in each transaction. In the process, merchants not only get real benefits, but also refresh their knowledge of block chains and digital currencies in every connection. Obviously, it’s much better than pushing hard to promote digital money.

The second characteristic of Bizkey is better than that of our peers: we pay more attention to channel docking and seldom face directly to merchants. Block chain intelligent POS machine is only an application in Bizkey ecosystem. We connect through API’s broader channels with a large number of merchant resources, especially the existing mobile payment channels. These channels often have their own payment and settlement system. A channel, through a week’s docking, can bring tens of thousands of new businesses to the Bizkey ecosystem. Not only can merchants get a corresponding amount of BZKY in the transaction process, but the channel will also get an additional 5% of the BZKY reward, called an indispensable node in the ecology. Bizkey now has payment channels in mainland China, Southeast Asia, Japan and South Korea. Without affecting the vested interests of Fiat, Bizkey can gain additional benefits and share the future of Bizkey ecology. This kind of quick docking and ecological win-win way will expand the number of merchants much faster than peers. In this era of rapid need, Bizkey has a huge advantage in business mode.

[Question five] It is really great to use Fiat trading links to constantly educate high frequency businesses. But what I want to ask is, after all, merchants get a BZKY reward for each Fiat transaction data link. In the long run, it is a subsidy behavior. Where does the cost come from? How did Bizkey earn it? In addition, the cost of this part is 0 for merchants. And since 30% of Bizkey’s tokens are sent out in vain, isn’t it causing serious selling pressure on BZKY?

Scarlett: you are right, but your understanding is rather narrow. In addition to free gifts, Bizkey also has a clear profit model.

First, merchants use such important trading data in exchange for BZKY rewards, which can not be regarded as a free gift. The most valuable commodity in the offline retail industry is transaction data. Mobile payment companies, aggregate payment companies, banks, local life service platforms are all digging their brains and spending huge costs in obtaining merchant data. Block chains, however, allow Bizkey merchants to quickly experience the pleasure of privatizing data assets, which is not BZKY for nothing, but very valuable. From the data ownership, we changed the bad habits of the past centralized platform. They get the BZKY cost from the merchants through a deal, high monthly rent and staff costs. It can only be said that the current BZKY price can not reflect the value of the data itself.

Secondly, we do not feel that a 3 billion BZKY in three years will hit the currency price. BZKY has many uses, not just to exchange money for sale. The most important function of BZKY is to offset transaction fees, so that merchants can pay lower costs in transactions. In addition, the number of BZKY holdings will also determine the ability of merchants to cross-capture customers throughout the ecosystem. The more you hold BZKY, the more you can enjoy the deduction of more general points, and the easier it is to achieve cross-drainage. Or in other words, in the near future, the digital retail industry can never exceed Fiat online. Businesses do business to get more customers, and more Fiat. Therefore, instead of selling BZKY on exchanges, it is better to hold BZKY to win more diversion. Finally, according to the number of BZKY in hand, BZKY holders will get the corresponding profit dividends in the ecosystem. It will also encourage more people to hold BZKY for a long time.

Once again, we believe that any project without profit mode is air. There’s a need to hurt their peers again. They want to make a profit in digital money at this stage. It’s ridiculous. Because first, the frequency of digital money payments is very low, if not more than 100,000 per day, fee sharing income may not even be able to support the team. Second, the fee for paying digital money should be lower. If it is higher than the Fiat fee and the efficiency is low, who will use it? No competition at all. It is difficult for Fiat to pay a service fee to keep a company pushing the business at the core. How can a team of 100 people be fed with lower fees and lower conversion rates? And also produce and sell POS? Only spending money and can’t make money in the short term， Can you do it? It is impossible for us to go to the block chain era, and we will not talk about the profit model and pursue the ideal only.

As we mentioned earlier, Bizkey establishes high-frequency relationships with merchants in every Fiat transaction. So when merchants get BZKY, they are the simplest traffic realizable profit models. At present, the value of BZKY is 0.1 yuan RMB, which is equivalent to the cost of 0.1 yuan to buy an effective touch of merchant traffic. On this callback page, we only need to provide merchants with supply chain products, credit products and financial products sales to get valuable traffic revenue. On Oct. 10, at the Bizkey product launch site, the 1% monthly calculus offered by bank of Hash Power highlights our profitability model. Not only can we use Bitcoin to educate businesses in depth, but the conversion rate of high-yielding financial products is as high as 1%, giving us a return of 30 times per effective flow. So 30% of the BZKY rewards to merchants will not put pressure on us to sell, inside and outside, optical flow model, we still have 10 times the current value of space.

So we never worry about whether BZKY is gratis or not. Because first of all, it is not gratis, and merchants need to pay a high price. Secondly, BZKY has a lot of uses and will not become a simple selling thing. Finally, a BZKY is a traffic profit mode of up to 10 times.

[Question six] At the product launch conference, you released many products and services at one go. Please describe the platform structure and product relationship of Bizkey in detail here. Let more people know the future trend of Bizkey in the technical system.

[Scarlett] I’m very sorry, but I know you’re criticizing the hasty preparation and the unclear product structure. I take this opportunity to elaborate on the technical structure of Bizkey in detail. From the structure, the whole Bizkey product technology architecture can be divided into three levels.

[Contract Layer] At the bottom of the open platform, smart contracts and smart books are designed to provide docking capabilities for various public chains. At present, support for Ethereum, next will gradually link EOS and BUMO and other public chains.

[Interface layer]. It is the middle tier of the open platform, providing docking capabilities for all Fiat-based mobile payment platforms, retail SaaS platforms, and application development. At present, 80% of the main interfaces have been developed and tested, and the third platform and applications are open for invocation. At present, more than 10 third party platforms are being docked. As the number of docking platforms increases, the number of merchants in the Bizkey ecosystem will also increase exponentially. Among them, such as E-Buy is a supermarket self-service channel of the quick cash App, is the e-Buy technology team docking Bizkey open platform for research and development.

Yukk, Indonesia’s largest local living platform (Volkswagen Review), is also docking with Bizkey’s open platform for block chain transformation. TicketGO, Taiwan’s largest coupon cancellation platform, is currently docking with Bizkey’s open platform for the transformation of App.

[Application layer] provides application development, auditing and publishing services for Bizkey eco contributors. We welcome any developers willing to empower the physical retail industry to develop applications based on the Bizkey interface layer, or to optimize existing applications using the Bizkey interface and token incentives. At present, more than five of the eco-partners are in the research and development stage, or in-depth testing stage, and will be launched to the market recently.

1) Time card: v1.0 is on line. It is a small program based on Biz key general integral. Users can get TIME general integral by digging, helping merchants to publicize and so on, and exchange privileges among many entity merchants. At present, there are more than 10,000 catering merchants in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong and Shenzhen, and more than 20,000 daily users.

2) BizPos: It’s a dual-screen block-chain smart pos. Its v1.0 prototype was launched in Beijing on October 10 and started small-scale production in November. The product supports merchants’ Fiat trading, i.e. mining, CRM system, card and voucher system, and digital currency payment and cash collection functions.

3) Biztalk: App beta version is being tested. It is a social product based on retail businesses of local entities. Merchants can communicate with each other, recommend each other and drain each other.

4) BizPay: Digital cash register expert. V1.0 is in the stage of research and development, and is about to go online. It is a very simple and convenient App that helps entities merchants to collect and settle digital money. The biggest feature of BizPay is that customers can pay in digital currency, and merchants can get their local Fiat settlement directly. V1.0 supports Singapore and Mainland China.

5) BizMap: It is in the research and development stage, and it will be launched on-line at the end of November. Any user can quickly find entities that support Bizkey general scores to complete transactions. Any merchant in Bizkey ecology can also find other merchants who can cooperate and realize win-wins through quick matching.

[Question 7]: Bizkey is not a typical block chain project in terms of technical architecture, much less a public chain project. It looks more like creating a scene and building a channel. So where does Bizkey use the related technology and thinking of block chain?

[Scarlett] We have never considered Bizkey a typical block chain project, and we are what you call a supporting facility for the block chain industry. We may not be high-tech spacecraft, but we are fences, steel bars, and cement for the launch site. We just want to create an offline scenario that will help provide access to more block chains and encrypted digital currency landings in the future.

But then again, Bizkey is also a block chain project, because we are making full use of block chain technology in many places, from data linking to our own platform currency and general points distribution, or DAC organizational structure.

We use block chain technology to capitalize, privatize, empower, and reward data producers.

The characteristics of the whole account: it can play the role of data tampering. Therefore, it can ensure the authenticity of transaction data (desensitization) and business model of entity retailers, and avoid the possibility of arbitrary tampering and profiteering marketing by centralized platform for commercial interests.

Decentration’s characteristics: it coincides with the de centralization of physical retail scenes. Therefore, the efficiency of mutual diversion and cross marketing between local merchants is much higher than that of the centralized platform.

Block chain’s peculiar economic model: it can encourage merchants and third-party partners to join the ecology, and accelerate the ecological construction.

[Question 8]: You have mentioned many times that Bizkey empowers the real economy. How on earth does Bizkey provide more help to merchants than trading or mining?

Scarlett: Empowering entities, cross-guidance. This is the question we most like to answer. Fiat payments do occur frequently, and we believe that with three years of effort, Bizkey will bring more than 1 million offline physical merchants to the industry. But beyond that, if we can do more for businesses, they will naturally be more ecologically connected. Offline retailers are the core unit of this ecosystem. Bizkey will continue to strengthen the relationship between merchants in the ecological environment.

In addition to desensitizing transaction data and getting BZKY rewards, Bizkey can improve the customer capacity and efficiency of physical retailers by cross-guidance.

Usually, people will think that only different industries can split up, but it is not true. “Market gathering” is a common phenomenon in physical stores, such as food street, commodity city, clothing street and so on. Merchants are similar in category, relying on similar location and mutual diversion. Within a region, a common score allows merchants to share customers, whether in the same trade or in different industries. Bizkey belongs to the dual Token economic model. One is BZKY, which represents merchant data assets, and the other is TIME General Integral. Small businesses don’t have to pay more Fiat costs. By awarding TIME points to users, and by making deductions at large businesses, users feel more affordable. For the big merchants, more small merchants can be obtained by cashing the general points, and win-win results can be achieved.

After long-term research by Bizkey and partners, we have also explored an efficient model of cross-guidance of life paths. That is to say, according to the customer’s life trajectory, we recommend another merchant who often haunts the site. For example, eating next to your office can recommend a fruit shop near your home. While buying fruits at home, you can also recommend tea that customers often drink when they go shopping. It breaks through the limitations of the original location and expands the scope of marketing promotion. After verification, the universal integral combined with the cross-guidance of life trajectory, so that the Bizkey ecology of the merchants to increase up to 30% of the repeat visitors.

We all know that the three most important parameters of the physical retail industry are “people, goods, markets.” Bizkey can help businesses in the ecology get more cross-guidance, bring customers. It can be through high-frequency contact with merchants, and constantly provide them with better goods, but also can break the geographical limits of physical stores, thereby expanding merchants’ marketing promotion. Shooting two birds with one stone. In the physical retail industry, we can see that often small regional data is more efficient.

[Question nine] Data privatization is a very harsh concept. Do you think they understand you when they are in contact with merchants? In addition, Bizkey and third-party channel cooperation, they will be important data link, will not let many channels unwilling to cooperate? Besides, why don’t they learn to do Bizkey themselves?

Scarlett: Data privatization is really a very difficult concept to understand. But over the years, businesses have begun to realize that centralization platforms are exploiting data for them. For example, Dianping, which began to be flooded with fake data, had to brush reviews for search volume and ranking. Otherwise, other paid businesses will squeeze them to the bottom of the list in minutes. Merchants are well aware that they have to pay close to 15% of the price for data in order to get a valid customer. At the same time, the Dianping was listed based on these data but did not give any shares to merchants. Bizkey, in contrast, serves as a Token ticket based on their contribution from the moment merchants link up the first transaction data. More work and more gains. Therefore, privatization of data assets is not particularly difficult to communicate.

In addition, cooperation with third-party channels involves linking transaction data, although desensitized, it is still resisted by many third parties. This is normal, any good thing must not be echoed at first, or even considered a tumor. At present, there seems to be only ten percent less cooperation rate, but these ten channels are enough. With the increasing popularity of block chain technology, Bizkey ecology will continue to expand. Of course, some people will want to do it themselves, but many collaborative channels also know that it is very difficult to transform the traditional model into a block chain project. People in the circle know more about how difficult it is. It would be better for us to unite and make the ecology bigger and the influence bigger. Although each person occupies a smaller proportion, but the number is bigger. This is clear to the wise channel traders.

[Question 10] According to the white paper, merchants get 30% of BZKY Token, Bizkey’s key partners end up with a 5% share, and the Bizkey team has a 15% share. Isn’t it unfair or deliberate to use your Token’s distribution? Will the channel’s role in the future Bizkey ecosystem be weakened?

[Scarlett] Thank you for watching so carefully. In fact, we haven’t noticed the 30% share of the foundation. We will set up an ecological Committee in parallel with the Foundation to award nodes each year that have made outstanding contributions to the ecosystem. 3% of Token is allocated to the ecosystem committee each year. The Ecology Commission, by contribution, distributes channels for bringing businesses to Bizkey, as well as other construction contributors. After 10 years of distribution, the Foundation will eventually become the management and control body of the Ecology Commission, truly in charge of Bizkey Ecology.

Here, I would like to say more. I think the vast majority of projects in the block chain industry today are managed by teams that control the entire project development from start to finish. I call on all block-chain media and rating agencies to take the foundation’s setting and future planning as an important measure of the future.

[Ending]

After nearly three hours of communication, we felt the dedication and effort of a real business team. It’s true that it’s a sexy idea to let digital money pay into our lives, but the reality is so cold that we have to calm down this winter to think and make choices. Sometimes, choices are more important than hard work, and we hope Bizkey has chosen the right path, and that they will always keep the initiative and earnestness, and steadfastly follow it.