Unveiling the Boom Ecosystem
e-commerce without banking or frontiers
Background
The 2008 financial crisis revealed a stark reality. Traditional banking system practices, if left unchecked, could ignite a chain reaction that could bring the global economy to its knees. In a nutshell, this is exactly what happened in that fateful year. Dubbed by historians as the Great Recession, the catastrophic failure of the international banking system led to a historic spike in unemployment, wiped out $17 trillion in household wealth, millions of people lost their homes, and many other disastrous consequences. And crucially, the cataclysmic event sowed the seeds of distrust in these deeply rooted financial institutions. This, among other associated factors, indirectly led to the creation of Bitcoin the following year.
Prior to Bitcoin’s inception, the world had no backup financial system. No failsafe to trigger if traditional banking were to fail. And fail it did, in spectacular fashion.
Bitcoin (and cryptocurrencies in general) introduced a paradigm shift in the world’s financial ecosystem. Digital currencies enabled people to move value in a peer-to-peer fashion, without reliance on the long-established -and vulnerable, as it turned out- legacy banking system.
Blockchain as a means to restore fairness and enable inclusivity
Bitcoin, and most other digital currencies, are powered by blockchain technology. This means transparency, decentralization, and tamper-free transactions. But it means much more than that: it means inclusiveness for the estimated 1.7bn people around the world who do not have access to banking facilities. These unbanked people find themselves excluded from the digital economy and are unable to make purchases online, despite an estimated annual purchasing power of $5 trillion. And blockchain technology also means an equitable e-commerce field, as people in emerging countries enjoy the same opportunities as those in more developed areas of the world.
The Boom ecosystem
Most unbanked people live in Africa, a continent whose GDP is estimated to grow as much as tenfold to $29 trillion over the next quarter of a century.
The Boom ecosystem, powered by the Boom blockchain, is the world’s first blockchain dedicated solely to creating an inclusive and equitable commercial environment for everybody. Boom is the bridge that connects those 1.7 billion unbanked people to the global digital economy, through the Boom superapp.
Boom also solves a great challenge: that of people being unable to trade outside their borders, and here’s why. Africa has a population of roughly 1.3 billion people spread across 54 nations, with 44 different currencies. Boom resolves this significant challenge by tokenizing all local fiat currencies into stablecoins, and making them trading pairs with Boom’s native token, Boomcoin (BMC). Anyone participating in the Boom ecosystem can use these trading pairs to engage in cross-border transactions for the first time ever, using their local currencies.
The Boom blockchain & superapp
The Boom blockchain is open, transparent, and community-run. It uses a proof-of-commerce consensus mechanism, which means that anyone running a node and is providing liquidity to Boom’s decentralised exchange protocol, Boomswap, can become a validator.
The blockchain is home to the Boom e-commerce without banking superapp, a complete commerce ecosystem including:
- Boom Marketplace, where everyone can buy and sell goods and services online without the need for bank account to process payments.
- Boom Wallet, a wallet to send and receive funds and pay/get paid online.
- Boom Talks, a messaging app for secure communication.
- Boom Hose, a built-in social media app for community building and engagement.
Commerce app developers will be able to start building on this ecosystem from November 23, 2023.
Speaking about the superapp, Boom’s Chief Product Officer Naomi Whitney says: ‘The Boom superapp is the interface to the entire ecosystem. It gives both the banked and unbanked, the opportunity to leverage great technology. The unbanked needed a comprehensive platform to connect to the global digital economy, a place where commerce grows without boundaries. We built the Boom superapp as an omni-channel portal for commercial transactions and more.’
Boom ecosystem: all in the name of inclusivity
One of the main drivers for the Boom ecosystem’s design is the creation of a fair commerce ecosystem, and empower everyone to participate in the global digital economy and trading activity. By removing the need to have a bank account, Boom becomes a powerful tool of empowerment for those who had hitherto been excluded and sidelined. In one word, Boom promotes inclusivity in all aspects of its design and ethos. In fact, the Boom superapp is translated into 20 languages. This means that users of the superapp can, for the first time ever, pay, get paid, buy, and sell in their local language.
Naomi says ‘We have created the most inclusive marketplace on Earth, that connects buyers, sellers, and window shoppers around all categories of goods and services, with additional dedicated online stores for second-hand, luxury, hand-made, and B-to-B products.’
The Boom wallet
At the heart of the Boom ecosystem’s superapp is the wallet. Indeed, the wallet is the technological enabler of this innovation. The Boom wallet comes pre-loaded with 14 currencies, with more to come as Boom expands into more territories.
Boom ecosystem for merchants
Boom’s design makes it easy for merchants who might be interested in leveraging blockchain and cryptocurrencies, perhaps for creating new revenue streams.
Merchants can create their own online store in Boom and begin selling without having to build any infrastructure, such as a website or payment system. But for those merchants who already have all this in place, the ecosystem provides Boom Pay, a software development kit (SDK) that directly integrates into existing online stores.
Boom Pay can potentially unlock access to the global customer base by creating payment inclusivity and access to the digital economy for all. Boom Pay enables merchants to collect payments from the unbanked, and all other users at checkout.
Speaking about the Boom ecosystem, its founder, Peter Alfred-Adekeye, says: “The Boom ecosystem is the most advanced and the most complete alternative commerce infrastructure in the world. With this launch, we have ushered in a new era of inclusive commerce that will impact the way all of humanity transacts, over the next millennia, for the better”
**Payment just got inclusive**
https://youtu.be/T7K8jZzMfA0?si=lqKcJUfPHjDFnn_r
-by Fernando Sanchez, Senior Blockchain Writer & Editor