Factors such as the large number of intermediaries, lack of standards, low efficiency, lack of transparency, and high costs make blockchain payments have great potential.
Written by: 1912212.eth, Foresight News
With the continuous development of blockchain technology, many outdated financial infrastructures are in urgent need of transformation and renewal. Credit cards and other payment methods that users consider convenient and fast are actually complicated and involve many intermediate procedures, and the final cost is still borne by consumers.
Let's take an example to understand the process behind it. When a user pays a merchant, the merchant sends the transaction information to the acquiring bank (the merchant's bank card), and the acquiring bank sends the transaction request to the credit card network (such as Visa, MasterCard, etc.), which forwards the request to the issuing bank (the consumer's bank). The issuing bank verifies the consumer's credit limit and account status, and then decides whether to authorize the transaction.
If the transaction is approved, the issuing bank sends an authorization code to the credit card network, which passes this information to the acquiring bank, and the merchant finally receives the authorization confirmation. At the end of the day's transactions, the merchant submits all authorized transactions to the acquiring bank for batch processing. The acquiring bank sends the batched transaction information to the credit card network. The credit card network distributes the transaction information to the corresponding issuing bank.
Factors such as too many intermediaries, lack of standards, low efficiency, lack of transparency, and high costs make blockchain payments a promising area. Zebec Network is the payment infrastructure of blockchain.
From Zebec Protocol to Zebec Network
Founded in 2021, Zebec initially focused on building a blockchain payment flow system based on Solana, providing real-time and continuous cash flow for financial transactions (including wages, payments, investments, and purchases).
In February 2022, Zebec completed a $15 million private placement financing, led by Distributed Global and Solana Ventures, with participation from Lightspeed, Circle, Alameda Research, DST Global PartnersCoinbase, OKX Ventures, etc. In the public offerings such as IDO shortly afterwards, it received another $13 million in financing, bringing the total financing amount to $28 million.
In March this year, Zebec Protocol upgraded its brand and changed its name to Zebec Network. It changed from a pure cash flow salary payment to a decentralized fund facility for RWA cash flow and released White Paper V2.
Its products and services include Zebec card, RWA payment, L3 chain Nautilus, DePIN and asset management.
Zebec Prepaid and Debit Cards (Black Cards)
In late 2023, Zebec launched the Zebec Instant Card, a non-custodial, multi-chain, fee-free prepaid card. Available in over 130 countries and supported by Visa and Mastercard, the Zebec prepaid card allows users to instantly spend cryptocurrency in their chosen fiat currency for everyday purchases without paying transaction fees.
In addition, Zebec has also launched a black card service, which is equivalent to a debit card, charging about 1% and no annual fee. Official data shows that more than 1,000 cards have been activated in the past week or so, and are compatible with Bitcoin, Ethereum, and BNB Chain.
RWA payment flow application WageLink
Zebec’s application WageLink integrates blockchain capabilities into traditional payroll systems, such as near-zero-cost cross-border remittances and USDC salary payments. It also provides payroll tools such as early payment, budgeting, bill payment, and payment cards, all in a unified application.
In May this year, Zebec also strengthened its cooperation with RWA protocol Ondo and integrated its stablecoin USDY.
Official website data shows that its number of corporate users has reached 250, the total transfer volume exceeds US$1 billion, and the number of monthly active users has risen to 50,000.
DePIN
As the infrastructure of Web3 payment, physical equipment is a necessary element. In its new white paper, Zebec stated that it will launch POS devices that support Zebec Network, specifically creating an integrated cryptocurrency payment processing solution for merchants and consumers.
The device allows direct peer-to-peer transactions through a decentralized infrastructure gateway. The official website has now opened an advance booking window.
L3 Chain Nautilus
In 2023, Zebec developed the L3 chain - Nautilus. Nautilus is designed as a high-performance, modular blockchain optimized to support Zebec's RWA payment process and DePin infrastructure.
According to its white paper, its architecture adopts OP Rollups, and the initial TPS value can reach more than 2000, which can support payments, DeFi, and games.
So far, official data shows that the total number of transactions has exceeded 3.09 million, which is still a considerable gap compared to the top L1 or L2 chains.
Zebec Treasury
This function is mainly aimed at individuals, investors and enterprises, mainly providing them with safe fund management. Its management method uses multi-signature wallets and automated smart contracts to strengthen fund protection, and has been audited by many security audit institutions.
ZBCN Token Economics
The ZBCN token distribution is 4% for market makers, 6% for public offering, 9% for seed round, 11% for private round, 20% for contributors, and 50% for community and rewards. After the brand upgrade, the token name was updated from ZBC to ZBCN, and the total amount of ZBCN tokens was split 10 times to 100 billion.
The public offering round is unlocked immediately, while the seed round, private offering round and contributors have a 6-month lock-up period and then unlocked linearly over 3 years. Data shows that the current circulating supply is 50.58 billion.
ZBCN tokens are mainly divided into governance voting and functional categories. In addition to participating in voting and initiating proposals, ZBCN can be used as gas fees, as collateral for ecosystem protocols, and to obtain airdrops from some projects, etc.
Future Roadmap
Zebec's 2024 roadmap includes five major sections. DePIN will focus on introducing more partners and strengthening alliance cooperation in the fields of logistics and supply chain. WageLink will be integrated with human capital management systems (such as ADP and UKG) to simplify the salary payment process. Prepaid cards will support more public chains and integrate with Coinbase Pay to enhance functionality. Treasury management will strengthen cooperation with RWA protocols and provide asset management for different chains. The last item is to strengthen the integration and application of AI in product functions, and enhance intelligence and efficiency.