Menlo One Update Dec 2019

Reflecting on 2019

2019 was an interesting year for Menlo and for the blockchain space in general. Following the ICO boom it became apparent by 2019 that the crypto winter was not going to be kind to many early stage startups. Most startups had to scale back their ambitions, and many even closed down completely. But at the same time, we saw a lot more blockchain development in the enterprise space. So we focused our attention on bigger companies.

I’m a big fan of the Lean Startup Methodology. If you’re not familiar with it, the TLDR summary is that the most important activity a tech company does, even more important than building tech, is making sure they’re building tech that actually solves a problem for a customer. As simple as that sounds, it’s easy for a team to not check in to make sure they’re building the right thing.

With the success of our token sale, the many partnerships we formed, and all the feedback we gathered, we knew we were building the right framework for startups. But with the shift in the blockchain market, were we building the right tool for bigger companies? So after we released our alpha version in early 2019, we decided that instead of immediately launching our next version, we should reach out to see if we’re helping the growing market of enterprise teams building blockchain tech.

Supporting Enterprise

Over the course of 2019 we talked to a lot of teams in companies ranging from small startups to Fortune 100’s. We learned the needs of enterprise teams roughly the same but slightly different than startups. They both love that our framework lets them skip all the setup and jump in and start building robust dApps. But there were two areas where we realized we could help enterprise.

First they need more infrastructure support. Developers at bigger companies are often on entirely different teams than DevOps and working within the constraints of corporate IT infrastructure, so connecting to, downloading, or hosting a blockchain is challenging. Second, we learned that the biggest challenge facing enterprise is just finding people with expertise in blockchain so help them solve architectural problems. So this year we began offering support to enterprise.

Menlo Ones Goals for 2020

In 2019 Decentralized Finance applications like MakerDAO and Compound have become the leading uses cases for consumer focused blockchain. Already it’s looking like 2020 is going to be the year of DeFi and we’re pretty excited about it. It seems like both startups and institutional teams are going to be working on interesting products. Given that, we reprioritized our feature list for the next release.

1. Graph database
   We’re planning on building in support for a graph database on the Content Node. Graph databases are super performant when it comes to relation oriented data such as social media systems. Currently we’re exploring using GunDB with a local cache.
2. Easy deployment
   Right now deploying a Content Node is a multi step process. We’re going to simplify this process by packaging everything in a docker container. We’re also going to add support for Infura so you won’t have to download an Ethereum node on the server. While we think using an Ethereum node is good for the Ethereum network, using Infura will dramatically cut down on setup time and greatly reduce cost. We’re also going to set up a one click “Deploy to Heroku” button for the front end.
3. Abstracting front end
   We’ve had several requests to make the front end more bare bones. We’re going to move our demo dApp (Block Overflow) a separate repo, with just an app skeleton as the starting point for Menlo project.
4. Monetized Content Nodes
   Content Nodes will be able to get paid for their service. Imagine launching a Content Node for a DEX, and sharing in the profits from the fees. Payments will be over the Ethereum network and with the ONE™ token. We think this is Menlo’s killer feature.

Tooling for DeFi & Decentralized Exchanges

While many aspects of DeFi apps are decentralized, they still unfortunately rely on very traditional web servers. For example, while most DEX trades are executed on chain, everything else is stored on a centralized web server including the order book data, the application, and the front end interface. This presents a security risk to users and regulatory risk to projects for the same reason: it’s a single point of failure. Hypothetically the server administrator could front-run orders or otherwise manipulate users to their own benefit, which has drawn concern from many regulators. This flaw leaves DEXs and other DeFi apps vulnerable to censorship or worse, getting hacked.

We think the ideal solution is for end users to connect to one of many “Content Nodes” which serve mirrors of the application and interface. The order book and other data can be distributed across multiple nodes via web-sockets or WebRTC. Anyone could launch a DEX Content Node, and they could share in the profits from trading fees. Users could validate the authenticity of the data with other Content Nodes. Such a system would give users the speed and performance of a centralized exchange. This combined with the gas improvements in Ethereum 2.0 would prevent front-running attacks on DEXs.

Removing the dApps dependence on traditional centralized web server would improve the security any DeFi product, DEX or otherwise. While there is still a lot of work to be done, helping to create a truly decentralized DeFi system or DEX is a major goal of ours in 2020.

While there is still a lot of work to be done, the technology to build this is here today. We think there is huge potential here and we think finally people are ready to switch platforms.

If you’re building with Menlo we would love to hear from you. Please reach out here or in our Telegram