Messari: IoTeX outperforms its IoT competitors Helium, VeChain and IOTA

There are no other blockchain IoT projects as encompassing as IoTex, says Messari in an in-depth report

Crypto market intelligence firm, Messari, released an in-depth report stating that IoTeX “operates at a broader scale” than its competitors” by connecting a significantly more extensive range of IoT-enabled devices and machines in the real world.

Messari said IoTeX’s three top competitors are Helium, VeChain, and IoTa but said, “there are no other blockchain IoT projects as encompassing as IoTeX.2

“While Helium is working towards a related goal, it specializes in hotspot (internet) infrastructure. VeChain is also a related project, as it incentivizes network participants to run a distributed network supporting dapps,” the report states.

“Compared to Helium and VeChain, IoTeX operates at a broader scale – it connects a wider range of IoT-enabled machines in the real world,” the crypto market intelligence firm added. “Another potential competitor could be IOTA, an IoT transaction settlement and data transfer layer. While IOTA initially seemed to thrive in 2017, it fell behind due to the lack of real-world adoption.”

Poised for adoption

“IoTeX is poised for increased adoption as it plans to onboard new and legacy IoT devices without building them,” the report adds. “This could spur the development of dApps with real-world use cases while rewarding users who generate these proofs via their IoT devices.”

Messari adds that “the forthcoming release of a cross-chain data bridge (W3bstream) may further strengthen the position of IoTeX as the universal hub for machine intelligence in Web3.”

IoTeX’s W3bStream enables two-way communications between IoT devices in the real-world and Web3 decentralized applications (dApps). IoTeX collects raw data from tamper-proof IoT devices via a network of decentralized nodes (W3bstream) to prove activity in the real world, the report notes.

In a recent news statement, IoTeX CTO Qevan Guo said W3bstream is on his project’s roadmap and scheduled for “launch in the coming weeks.” He described W3bstream “as one of the most technologically-advanced data oracles. It enables proof of anything in the most trusted and genuinely verifiable way.”

Guo also said W3bstream will be launched and will support the Ethereum Merge. “This is very important because developers will be able to build MachineFi-focused dApps using W3bstream on both the IoTeX and Ethereum networks.”

Messari: How IoTeX works

“IoTeX technology serves as a platform for developers to build dapps. At the same time, with MachineFi, IoTeX provides an incentive layer for IoT device owners,” the Messari report indicates. “That is, device owners are rewarded for sharing the real-world activity with dapps. This enables a new generation of dapps powered by real-world data.”

Messari says, “Thanks to the Internet of Things (IoT), devices in the real world are getting smarter — be it wearables, home appliances, or connected cars. The economic value created by these devices may reach $13 trillion by 2030 — that’s more than half of the U.S. GDP in 2021 ($23 trillion).”

The research firm explains that the problem presently is that IoT devices are somewhat siloed, hindering their full potential. For instance, Messari says, “think of an Alexa not speaking with an Apple Watch. Or a Tesla not communicating with local Arduino weather stations. There’s an inherent design limitation preventing IoT devices from communicating with each other. IoTeX aims to bridge this gap by enabling secure communication between various IoT devices.”

Also, IoTeX Co-Founder and Head of Blockchain and Blockchain Research Dr. Xinxin Fan leads the IEEE P2958 Working Group in developing the global standards for blockchain-based decentralized identities. Fan began this effort in 2019 and aimed to make communication, interaction, and transactions possible between machines, devices, and people. IEEE is responsible for the global standardization of WiFi.

Messari: What is IoTEX

“At its core, IoTeX is a smart contract platform for bootstrapping large-scale machine networks in the real world. IoTeX enables dapps that leverage these machine networks for everyday usage. The IoTeX tech stack consists of the IoTeX blockchain, a middle layer, and a suite of tools.”

The IoTeX ecosystem currently consists of over 168 dApps on IoTeX with use cases that include MachineFi, DeFi, GameFi, and NFTs.

“The IoTeX Foundation launched the Halo Grants Program in October 2021 to accelerate dapp development across DeFi, NFTs, infrastructure, developer tools, and gaming. It also launched an additional $100 million sustainable ecosystem fund in March 2022 to support Web3 and MachineFi-driven projects. And more recently, made a developer portal available publicly.”

In June 2022, IoTeX launched MachineFi Lab, IoTeX’s core developer, in June 2022, aiming to develop the MachineFi economy. Following its launch, MachineFi Lab raised $10 million in a round led by Samsung Next, Draper Dragon Fund, and Jump Crypto. Since MachineFi Portal’s beta launch in January 2022, seven dApps have been deployed to its beta.

“We invested in MachineFi Lab because we think its platform has the potential to unify large-scale machine networks and to provide the infrastructure needed to enable each device to act as an autonomous market participant, providing incentives for consumers to help construct the network,” wrote Samsung Next in a blog on IoTeX.

According to IBTimes, Samsung Next Managing Director Raymond Liao said that IoTeX’s MachineFi push fits into several of his firm’s focus areas, adding that he wants to contribute to the further success of the machine financialization vision.

Web3 is the evolution of the internet as we know it. It represents a new reward economy that benefits people over corporations who have built trillion-dollar empires with profits from user data. The world is at the threshold of a unique opportunity for people and businesses to regain control of their data, smart devices, and machines and the value they generate.