I am not an employee of Bitpanda, this is a voluntary formatting and translation of the AMA that took place on Discord.
Presentation of the speakers :
Max | Bitpanda is the head of communication
Philip | Pantos is the Project Lead and responsible for our Product and Business Development efforts.
Markus | Pantos is the Lead Developer and is the mastermind behind our Alpha prototype
And last but not least Luis | Pantos who is the Technical Product Owner and oversees our technical roadmap and priorities.
Questions to the team
Q1: Can you introduce us to one or two product ideas with the Pan Tech in the Ama?! How do we set up a node, where and how do we get support?
Philip | Pantos :
Our primary goal is currently to launch the Pantos network and enable other token projects to implement the technology. In the future, there may be other use cases, especially in connection with smart contracts, but we don't want to speculate at this point. However, our research in the field is promising 😉
Markus | Pantos :
The technical knowledge required to run a Pantos node will be at about the same level as for other crypto nodes. There will be detailed documentation that is easy to understand for users with some technical understanding.
Q2: Will BEST be the first token as ERC-20 to receive the Pan Tech and what possibilities will BEST be able to receive as a "product idea" on the part of the Pantos technology? If the question cannot be answered, something similar to this will do.
Philip | Pantos :
As outlined in the original vision paper, the aim is that BEST will be one of the first tokens to implement Pantos technology and will therefore become a multi-blockchain token (with all benefits associated)
Q3: How did you come up with the idea of developing Pantos back then?
Max | Bitpanda :
I'll answer that one quickly, I guess this one was actually meant for Paul and Eric, but I'll share some more insights 🙂
Basically, Pantos was created out of pure necessity. Blockchain Interoperability is an important requirement for the long-term Adoption of cryptos. It is part of our strategic efforts to strengthen the ecosystem further and contribute to the space.
Q4: Which applications are possible with PAN for logistics or in the medical field
Luis | Pantos :
In principle, every use-case for which a blockchain makes sense will profit from using Pantos technology. Blockchain interoperability also opens up additional use-cases for blockchains. We're excited and looking forward to see what applications people will build on top of Pantos in the future.
Q5: What exactly is the marketing strategy at the beginning or during the beta? On which channels would Pantos want to be more present? What is the duration of the first marketing campaign? In which countries is targeted advertising operated? Is there a target how many "new customers" and devs you want to reach during the start phase?
Max | Bitpanda :
I'll take this one over as well, as I was involved in all the marketing calls
We understand that those questions are particularly interesting for the community, however, we also need to highlight again that we cannot disclose these details for the sake of the campaign yet. Of course one of our main goals is to substantially grow the project and community in the next few weeks and months.
Q6: How are you planning to achieve the full decentralisation of Pantos?
Luis | Pantos :
Step by step. Initially, every user who wants will be able to operate a service node during our beta. Decentralised validation is currently under development. Eventually (but still in the distant future) all governance decisions as well as the ownership of the contracts should be transferred to the community and Pantos could be even transformed into a DAO.
Q7: How is Pantos Marketing financed?
Philip | Pantos :
As the OG community members will remember, we have enough funding in the form of 616 BTC raised back in 2018, which are all still available and we are eager to use them for the long-term wellbeing of the project - however we will continue to look for favourable market conditions before we liquidate any funds 🙂
Q8: Are there any updates on the RBI and ABC partnership side?
Philip | Pantos :
There is currently no update on this side, as our main focus in the last few weeks and months has been on our own development efforts to finally bring Pantos live. However, there are weekly Jour Fixes, where we mutually align with both partners on how we all best benefit from this partnership, to not only grow the PAN ecosystem but also to develop financial products of interest for RBI (areas we discuss: e-money services, stablecoins, bonds etc. - there's lost of potential application areas we can think of) - ABC helps with exploratory research to gauge which options may be most favourable to go after.
Q9: What is the status of the cooperation with IOTA?
Philip | Pantos :
We as Pantos + Stefan and Matteo from CDL-BOT are in regular exchange both on the research and the development side, mostly with Dom and Billy Sanders. We are currently not working on the integration of IOTA, but we will take a closer look at Shimmer as soon as it is EVM-compatible.
Q10: What is the plan for external cooperation (bounties etc)?
Max | Bitpanda :
As part of the beta, we will announce more community bounties, we already have a few ideas. However, we will also take community feedback into account in order to support the best ideas and projects built on Pantos.
Q11: What role will LBS play? If I remember correctly, mainly in the choice of other blockchains? Or are there other areas where they will support Pantos?
Luis | Pantos :
They support us mainly with data analytics and give us insights which we can then use to prioritise our development roadmap accordingly. The choice of new blockchain integrations is only one example where data from LBS can support us.
Q12: Will transactions with PAN become cheaper, even if fees have to be paid on the blockchains and PAN? Is the operation of nodes profitable despite the expense of blockchain fees?
Luis | Pantos :
The amount of the fees is determined by the operators of the nodes via a bid system. In the long term, of course, it is to be expected that the node operators will charge sufficiently high fees to cover their costs and operate profitably. Our focus has been from the first day to develop a highly optimised (cost-efficient) and secure solution
Q13: Can I run multiple nodes and register them on the different Pantos Hubs? How high will the stake be or what will it be based on?
Markus | Pantos :
One (service or validator) node will be able to support all or only a subset of the Pantos-supported blockchains, i.e., the node has to be registered at the PantosHub of the chosen blockchains. The minimum stake can be set by the contract owner (currently us, later maybe a DAO) and will be high enough to prevent misbehaviour and low enough to allow enough people to operate a node. It’s also possible to run multiple nodes. However, usually this will not bring any benefits.
Q14: What are the requirements to become a Validator Node and can Service Nodes become Validator Nodes?
Luis | Pantos :
Validator Nodes and Service Nodes are two separate components of the Pantos system. However, nothing is stopping a user from running both a Service Node and a Validator Node, and this could actually become a quite common setup as soon as the Pantos network is running fully decentralised.
Q15: Will it be possible to stake PAN in the future?
Max | Bitpanda :
So as you probably already know there will be stakes required for the operation of nodes, both service and validator nodes. We are currently evaluating different aspects of Staking. However, we will deep-dive into this topic in the near future and might even publish a detailed blog post on this, so please bear with us for now
Q16: Will Pantos be listed at more Exchanges one day?
Philip | Pantos :
Q17: Pantos DAO?
Max | Bitpanda :
We already shared some insights about that today. We can't give you any more details at the current stage and it will not be part of the initial Pantos launch.
Q18: 616 BTC ICO funds still there?
Max | Bitpanda :
That's an easy one... Yes!
Q19: Do you have any plans for the PAN reserve?
Max | Bitpanda :
We are not planning to use any big chunks of the reserve, however, we might use some of it for business development or strategic reasons. We cannot disclose any details yet however.
Q20: Are the team token still locked?
Philip | Pantos :
The team tokens are not locked, however, if we distribute any of those tokens in the future there will be a vesting period. So that there is no possibility that large amounts can be dumped from our side.
Q21: What are the ideas regarding the future operators of Validator/Service Nodes? Target group: professional companies or will lone fighters with Raspi, shared hosting, etc. also be able to participate in a meaningful way?
Markus | Pantos :
As mentioned before, a certain basic understanding will be necessary to set up a node. However, our focus is to make the operation as easy and resource-saving as possible. Our node software does not require any extraordinary resources to run and should run e.g. on a usual AWS instance. We will of course share more detailed information on the minimum requirements in the near future.
Q22: In order to forward a transfer request as a service node, I must have provided a stake in Pan. In order to pay the fees on the BC involved, I need the corresponding "currency". Will there be an instant swap function in which I can store predefined assets, for example Pan can swap for this operation? So I wouldn't need to keep any other coins/tokens in stock. In principle, like on the Bitpanda Visa Card, I could choose which asset I would like to use for the fee swap.
Markus | Pantos :
Of course it is essential to make this as simple as possible. We are planning to build interfaces to various trading bots in order to allow node operators to buy the required coins at favourable prices. However, we will not impose an explicit strategy as there is no universal solution here and we also don’t want to constrain the node operators in their decision making.
Q23: Will more than 15000 pans be needed for one node?
Luis | Pantos :
This will depend on various factors, like also e.g. the token price. Our goal is to get the economic incentives right in the sense that the stake is high enough to discourage malicious actions, but still make running a node accessible to as many people as possible.
Q24: I also have an emotional question. How is the team doing so close to the countable, how have you been looking forward to it, what are you most looking forward to, what do you wish for the project, where do you personally want it to be in 2 to 5 years, how can the community support it in the best possible way, what has been the most exciting time in the project for you so far, or which one will top this time, and why?
Max | Bitpanda :
We are proud, excited and motivated. We have been working towards this for a long time and despite all adversities, we have stayed true to our line and achieved good results. We really hope that especially the current events in the crypto space will shake up people and especially projects to focus on the really important things: BUIDL!
Q25: Will other blockchains be included instead of Terra Luna?
Luis | Pantos :
Of course, we are working as hard as possible to eventually integrate all major possible blockchains. We have many chains in the pipeline and you can rest assured that our developers won't be bored now that LUNA didn't work out
Q26: Have other companies (Socios, for example) already expressed interest in the Pantos technology?
Max | Bitpanda :
Yes, we see a lot of interest in solid interoperability solutions. No concrete new partnerships so far, but we expect some new partners soon.
Q27 : Beta still starts Q2/Q3 2022 ?
Max | Bitpanda :
Yes !
