XYO Year in Review: 2020
It’s been a year. I think we can all agree on that.
Since March, most of XY — The Persistent Company (and by extension, most of XYO Foundation) has been working from home, like many of the world’s more fortunate office workers. (A massive thanks must go to our fulfillment team — Fontayne, Danny, and Ricky — for getting your COIN, XY, and XYO orders to you safely, all while looking out for each other.)
This has been a change for us. We’re used to the bustle of downtown San Diego; the blasting of the trolley horn, the places we’d sit outside for lunch (year-round in this city), the collaboration and camaraderie of our office. Some members of the team have families with young children, others live completely alone, and each set of circumstances comes with unique challenges.
Normally on Fridays, the extended XY team meets at the end of the day for a longtime tradition we call Happy Hour, because participants are encouraged to have a beer and socialize. It’s both a catch-up and a very informal team building exercise, which we’ve continued over Google Meet. This past week, with Christmas falling on a Friday, we held it on Wednesday instead. (Jessica won Markus’s mixology contest with her homemade pomegranate gin fizz garnished with rosemary.)
Arie, the CEO of XY, took a few minutes to talk about our progress this year. A lot of you are used to XYO being splashy, edgy, and in-your-face in the way we present ourselves to the world. But after taking a step back in 2019 to reorganize, reprioritize, and develop, this year (despite all odds) we saw the things we’ve long dreamed of begin to come to fruition.
Arie let us know we should be proud of all we accomplished this year. He’s always been against working from home, but he told us he’s been pleasantly surprised by what our small and dedicated team has been capable of without the need for immediate supervision. He expressed confidence in the direct, material effect each member is having. Further, he believes the model we’re currently working with is more sustainable than what we’ve tried in the past.
If you’ve followed COIN, you know how much XY’s gamified app has taken off, and by being so closely tied to this partner, XYO has been able to concentrate on building meaningful infrastructure. The most important of these developments was the launch of XYO World in August, which we have continued to expand and develop ever since.
Over 1,300 XYO World geotokens have been minted, each one representing a possible sponsorship of a piece of the world in integrated geolocation apps such as COIN. With COIN providing the proof of concept (and netting a lot of sponsors who want permanent access to COIN’s highly engaged user base), XYO World is poised to do amazing things for XYO Network in 2021. And it’s laid the foundation for other big developments for XYO. (Psst.)
Further bolstering the XYO infrastructure, COIN’s development and adoption of the SentinelX NFC has made creating and offloading bound witnesses for XYO Network more affordable, easy, rewarding, and accessible than ever before.
We can also proudly say that our efforts have helped to stabilize the XYO token and bring it unique, intrinsic value for XYO World users. Token values are always a roller coaster ride, but there’s no doubt there’s been an overall trend of improvement over the course of 2020. Also at play in this were developments such as the introduction of MetaMask’s amazing Swaps feature, fully compatible with XYO, and CoinMarketCap’s listing of Uniswap’s XYO/WETH pairing and Bilaxy’s XYO/ETH pairing.
In 2020, the XYO Foundation has found its footing. Our not-for-profit aims are firmly rooted in the sponsorship, governance, and developments of XY — The Persistent Company, while being proven and propagated by XY Labs (the COIN division).
We know we’re among the lucky ones — not everyone still has their health, family, and career in tact. That only makes us more grateful for the lessons 2020 brought us. We learned how to succeed with self-discipline, reduced costs, a small but dedicated team, and a shared purpose.
And, of course, we’re grateful for you. See you next year, friends.
