Analysis of Tierion ICO – New Standard for Verifiable Data

Summary

Project Overview

What does the company/project do?

Founded in 2015 and based in Silicon Valley, Tierion utilizes the blockchain to anchor data to prove the integrity and timestamp of any data, file, or process. Tierion was the Consensus 2015 Makathon winner.

Tierion introduced the Chainpoint protocol, the first standard proof format for anchoring data to a blockchain. Chainpoint runs as a service on the Tierion Network. Together, they provide a universal platform for data verification that operates at a great scale.

In April 2016, Tierion has raised $1 million in seed funding from several venture capital firms, including Blockchain Capital, Fenbushi Capital, and Digital Currency Group.

Here is a video introducing Tierion as explained by its CEO (video is 3:12 long):

There are numerous use cases for the project. Below are some of the examples:

Process audit trail – Cryptographic proof of the order, integrity, and timestamp of any business process. Supply chain, insurance claims, know your customer (KYC), hospital patient care, financial transactions.

Document timestamping – Several companies offer free timestamping services using the Chainpoint protocol.

LoT data collection – Prove the integrity and timestamp of data as it is gathered from connected devices.

Proof of consent – Non-repudiable evidence that important consent and approvals have been recorded. Patient care, corporate governance, etc.

Registry – A verifiable registry of creative works, real estate listings, etc.

Data security – Secure the integrity of key IT assets; customer records, databases, log files, backups, and virtual machine snapshots.

Clinical trials – Provide regulators with proof of the integrity of data for clinical trials.

There are several advantages in using Tierion’s services over other Blockchain solutions:

How advanced is the project?

The original version of Tierion was created in 2015 and has been used by thousands of organizations. Some of Tierion’s customers generate millions of proofs per month. Tierion is partnered with companies including Philips and Microsoft. Accredible is also a customer of Tierion.

After almost two years of development, Chainpoint has been upgraded to version 3.0. To continue improving on its services, Tierion is going to launch the Tierion Network and transform the company from a cloud application company into a global distributed network. The Tierion Network and Chainpoint Service has been operating in private beta with Tierion’s partners.

An open beta is planned to launch in August 2017, which marks the two year anniversary of Tierion’s launch. Microsoft’s infrastructure is planned to come online shortly thereafter. The Tierion Network is planned to launch before the end of 2017.

What are the tokens used for and how can token holders make money?

TNT serves two primary functions:

Node operators can accumulate TNT as a result of operating a Node. Node operators will also need to maintain a minimum balance of TNT in order to be eligible for those periodic rewards.

Tierion and its partner commitments guarantee that for the first year, nodes will be able to send data to core at zero cost. Over time, the network will transition to a model where nodes spend TNT for anchoring data.

Users do not need to run a node or acquire tokens to use the Tierion Network. Each node serves as a mini-Tierion. Node operators can provide users with services using conventional payment and delivery models.

The core Chainpoint service will be complemented by several unannounced services that use TNT. Examples include services for securely sharing verifiable data, document notary and archival, and attestations related to blockchain verifiable identities.

Team

Tierion has a team of 5. Other than the CEO, all the team members have relevant experience in software development.

Wayne Vaughan, Founder, CEO – Twenty years of software and product design experience. Founded a digital agency in the mid-90s and created one of the first SaaS marketing automation platforms. He also serves on the Advisory Board of Blockchain Capital.

Jason Bukowski, Founder, Lead Developer – Over twenty years of experience developing highly scalable software. He built one of the first real-time web analytics systems and spent a decade developing marketing automation software. Jason is the lead developer of several popular open source crypto libraries.

As Tierion is funded by several cryptocurrency investment funds, it has a strong connection with other players in the field. Advisors to Tierion include William Mougayar, board member of The Ethereum Foundation and Openbazaar, Zaki Manian, co-founder of Skuchain, Ryan Shea, CEO of Blockstack, and Shawn Wilkinson, Founder and CTO of Storj.

Opportunities

• Partnership with Microsoft and Philips proofs that Tierion is a legitimate company.
• Tierion’s services is used by over a thousand companies, which shows that Tierion is proven to provide valuable services to its customers.
• Tierion has been around for 2 years with a working product that is in the third iteration, which makes this ICO a lot less risky than those with shorter track record.
• Tierion won the 2015 Consensus Makathon, which shows the competency of the team.
• Blockchain is integral to the services provided by Tierion, so it makes more sense to raise money from ICO.
• Factom is another solution that tackles the same problems that Tierion is trying to solve. But according to CEO of Tierion, Factom can only manage 47 transactions per second while Tierion’s capacity is virtually unlimited.

Concerns

• The hard cap of $25 million is relatively high in today’s market environment.
• Right now, one of the Tierion’s advantages is the low cost compared to other solutions with costs correlated with transaction fees on public Blockchain (for example, Bitcoin). With the Bitcoin scaling debate finally getting over, it is anticipated that Bitcoin transaction fees will decline, at least in the short-term after the upgrade. This may make Tierion’s solutions less attractive.

Conclusion