Cross-Chain Connector|Search Engine

[IMPACT]

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Our proposed solution is to build a massive search engine of blockchain related projects with a focus on recording project key contacts, contact information, APIs, Githubs, Integration links, and more. BlockchaininBusiness.io will make it easy to find projects being built across many chains, evaluate them, and make the necessary technical or human contacts to partner via a project's official channels.

Facilitating cross-chain collaboration starts with identifying which projects are available that are worthwhile collaboration partners; and then subsequently making it easy to connect and review official project sources presented in a clear format.

The elements of the BlockchaininBusiness.io Cross-Chain Connector and Search Engine will include, but not me limited to the following:

• ability to search for projects by chain
• ability to search for dapps by chain
• ability to search a chain and see a project listing
• ability to search for projects by available resources
• ability to search for projects that have committed resources to the blockchain as authoritative
• the platform will employ test, faceted, and filtered search
• a novel element of the platform is to allow projects and listings to declare the chains they are working with resulting in entries that are auto-generated from their cross-chain linkage
• the platform will maintain metrics on whether the project has been catalyst funded, permanent, open-source, transitional, cross-chain / multi-chain
• the platform will have a section for listing events, seminars, and learning tools that highlight cross-chain multi-chain applications and functionalities
• the platform will include an e-learning component where developers will be encouraged to upload asynchronous educational material explaining their integrations - the shared revenue generating potential of this will be explored.

For the administration side of the application, we will enable chains and project owners alike to determine which information of theirs they would like committed to the blockchain as a means of providing an authoritative resource set for partners and developers alike.

Please see attached overview presentation:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1r7KAsnYb7cVSxiDcfL5b7CV9Ll4Y7VPSzgD_TwiSjF8/edit?usp=sharing

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Blockchain is hard. Cardano is harder. Integrating between different blockchains is hardest. Figuring out where to go, who to contact, and what resources are reliable in your integration and partnership journey is a near impossibility.

In order for adoption to grow, developers and business users alike need reliable information on which projects are out there, who is behind them, and which of their sources are authoritative from the perspective of the project owners.

Ultimately this authoritative list should be, at the option of the project owner, committed to the blockchain in the event that the project owner would like to stake an indefinite ownership to a particular virtual asset associated with a project.

This demonstration of commitment also enables prospective and partner developers a higher degree of confidence in committing resources to a particular set of API or integration procedures

Cross-chain collaboration is key to gaining and expanding market-share for Cardano and creating value for Ada holders. The reality is, Web3 application development is moving beyond the silo of blockchain specific thinking to business solution thinking.

By facilitating the ability to integrate with and seek integration for on-going projects, it allows the ecosystem of ideas to flourish with minimal duplication. If there exists a successful application that is operating on a specific chain, the developers goal will increasingly become how to integrate with that existing application or how to be the first to introduce that existing application to a new community in a new way.

In this way, the concept of cross-chain collaboration is not just at a foundational level; rather it will be driven by business and use cases that demand it.

BlockchaininBusiness.io will be that mechanism that streamlines the process for:

• entrepreneurs to find viable projects with which to begin development
• developers to determine how to connect to existing projects using authorized and verified linkages

As this is a Cardano based project that would be funded by Cardano, the visibility of Cardano related projects can be granted premium billing and, of course, the verification process will involve writing project resources to Cardano, regardless of the chain or decentralized ledger provenance of the project.

This provides Cardano with an innate strategic advantage and visibility.

From an Africa and Emerging Economy Startup perspective, the BlockchaininBusiness.io platform will provide a one stop shop for developers, providers of capital, potential clients, and enthusiasts alike to research projects and perhaps make a determination to engage. This builds value for the developer and prospective investors.

BlockchaininBusiness.io through its design will enable organizations in Africa that seek partners and collaborators to expand. Through our association with Wada, we are able to give a platform for native grown African projects to be "listed" along with international projects enabling them to be made visible to the broader Web3 community.

This project aligns with the Fund8 strategic goals in the following ways:

• It helps people find projects in the Cardano and Cardano ecosystem to either use or contribute to
• It helps expose Cardano projects beyond the Cardano community which will spur the development of cross-chain integration tools and API that will contribute to the Cardano project becoming more open-source.
• It accelerates the growth and evolution of our developer & app ecosystem by inviting contributions from the rest of the blockchain space.

Key Project Metrics:

To facilitate measurement, tools that record these metrics will be built into the platform as a form of cross-chain dashboard. Many of these metrics will involve self-reporting.

• Number of Catalyst proposals including participants from other blockchain communities - will increase because if Cardano projects and other blockchain projects can find each other, they can turn to Catalyst to fund their integrations which can then be served as a model for others or develop into tools that can be used by other projects
• Number of technical implementations connecting Cardano to other blockchains - will increase as the BlockchaininBusiness.io interface will be specifically designed to highlight ways in which projects can be integrated with
• Ideas from other chains implemented by Catalyst - will increase since these project currently do not cross-talk in a systematic way with the Cardano community; having a single point of publicization will enable us to promote the existence of Catalyst to not only specific non-Cardano chains, but to a broad array of non-Cardano chains within one platform
• Projects and dapps from other chains implemented on Cardano - this will be made possible because in listing these dapps and projects, the ability to be the first to create an interaction with the Cardano community provides a first to market opportunity to expose a non-Cardano project to the Cardano community; there is value in this
• Catalyst-created solutions adopted by other chains/communities - the search and directory function enables developers to explore and determine those projects which are best suited for adoption
• Number of events / workshops / sessions arranged with other communities - the BlockchaininBusiness.io platform will have an event section highlighting these cross-chain opportunities
• Number of permanent initiatives with cross-chain teams (members from different blockchain communities together) - the platform will highlight multi-chain dapps and projects via filtered or faceted search

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The technical aspect of the project is low risk. We will be using the Joget-Cardano plugin that is currently in development that was funded as a result of our successful Fund 7 proposal "Accelerating Enterprise Adoption" https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/383332. This is a great advantage to us and enables to build and deploy Cardano leveraging enterprise web applications quickly and easily.

• The interface elements and user experience elements of the implementation will be standard
• The most challenging high risk aspect is how much do we automate via crawlers and bots vs. the deployment of human intervention in populating BlockchaininBusiness.io.
• Another critical consideration is incentivizing projects to commit their resources to the blockchain and managing the associated gas fees of this in a reasonable manner that does not deter participation
• Further consideration to the staffing and management of directory data entry
• Ultimately a system such as this is only as reliable as the data that is entered into it - we have to ensure that the data entered is true and accurate in order to maintain the trust of the community
• Defining a future revenue model for the platform without it becoming cluttered or losing the core functionalities that the platform was designed to fulfil

[FEASIBILITY]

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Total Project Duration 6 Months

1 Months Post Funding (Planning, Outreach, Specification Design)

• create project technology specification
• identify leading chains and their signature projects
• define best approach for connecting with Catalyst funded projects
• build project awareness and establish website
• onboard Wada and build awareness about data entry and research requirements
• create employment / FTE requirement plan

2 Months (Technology Implementation)

• build application on Joget with admin console for writing records to Cardano
• build reporting modules
• build out application interface
• build automation and crawling features

2 Months. (Populate & Promote)

• data entry and validation - metrics will need to be defined for number of entries per person per day
• facilitate public participation in data entry
• promotion through Cardano and 10 selected chain authorities
• begin online, event, and e-learning population and promotion
• test revenue generating models with key partners
• Audit and submit project closeout report
• Monitor & Sustain project gains

1 Month. (Initiate Sustainability)

• implement revenue generating models
• Audit and submit project closeout report
• Monitor & Sustain project gains

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Budget: 50 000 USD

20 000 USD: Build - Design, Technical Implementation, Deployment

• 10 000 USD - develop Cardano blockchain system administration, data entry and data verification module with potential for project profile NFT support
• 2 500 USD - develop search listing console
• 1 500 USD - develop crawler and / or capture mechanism
• 1 000 USD - automated cross chain / multi-chain child-project listing generator
• 1 500 USD - develop design user-interface (public, admin, listing-owner) with potential for revenue generating support via e-learning, featured events, featured listings, and more
• 2 500 USD - develop reporting / automated metric capture tool
• 1 500 USD - hosting, scaling, infrastructure

30 000 USD: Deploy - Populating, Outreach & Awareness, Sustainability

10 000 USD Populating

• target 10 non-Cardano chains at the highest levels for integrated partnership
• populating non-Cardano chain projects
• populating funded catalyst projects
• network outreach with regional ambassador for project population

15 000 USD Promotion

• promotion of platform online
• promotion of platform at events, conferences, seminars
• direct corporate outreach
• travel & coordination

5 000 USD Sustainability

• establish and manage revenue model for long-term project sustainability
• creating environment for organic listing growth
• working with partners to define novel feature pages, filters, and facets

>>>Has a combined 25+ years' experience in Project Management and Engagement (West Africa, Canada) Healthcare (UK, Canada) and brings a wealth of experience and passion to this project. Mercy is responsible for WADA coordination, and building partnerships.

• Mercy - Coordination Lead @ Wada. Is the Funded Proposer's Rep on Catalyst Circle v3 and sees this project as another way for Catalyst Projects to easily find each other to collaborate She has a combined 25+ years' experience in Project Management and Engagement (West Africa, Canada) Healthcare (UK, Canada) and brings a wealth of experience and passion to this project. Mercy is responsible for WADA coordination, and building partnerships. https://www.linkedin.com/in/mercy-tachie-menson-77b10931/
• Andrew Forson - Technology Lead @ SCI. Has significant experience in the blockchain application space with past and/or present Cardano related roles with Emurgo, Joget, IAMX, Empowa, and more. https://www.linkedin.com/in/paforson/
• Joget: https://www.joget.com/cardano-blockchain.html
• Wada network and advisors: https://www.wada.org/about-us/

[AUDITABILITY]

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Operational Measures of Progress:

• number of listings
• number of chains with listings
• number cross-chain listings
• number of listings with Github links, API links, Integration links
• geographic footprint of listings
• number of listings taking advantage of the blockchain validation / verification feature
• revenue model

Strategic Measures of Progress:

• Number of initiated non-Cardano focused blockchain entities in Africa collaborating with Wada and submitting cross-chain proposals into Catalyst
• Number of cross-chain projects initiated with current Wada partners
• Number of new partners who are working on other blockchains outside of Cardano identified for cross chain partnership
• Number of high profile Africa focused DLT events targeted to receive rapid funding Catalyst sponsorship and funded.
• Metrics of Catalyst and Cardano visibility at sponsored conferences.
• Number of contacts made and followed up by Wada delegate/s attendance to virtual and in person non-Cardano events in member countries
• Number of African startups identified to pilot Wada's Africa Startups onboarding platform; WadaDex
• Project closed on time and within budget

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Success for this project looks like this:

• a publicly available search engine in which text, facets, and filters can be used to find projects that are using blockchain in their business in single chain or cross-chain modalities
• an admin console for project owners to be able to update their project coordinates and commit longstanding assets to the blockchain as a form of verification
• the employment of volunteers and paid staff, preferably out of emerging markets, to assist with the population and administration of the search engine above and beyond any crawlers / automated tools that would be employed
• in the long-run a financially self-sustaining tool that generates revenue through the provision of premium services to include but not be limited to highlighted projects

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Linked proposals:

Accelerating Enterprise Adoption of Cardano with Joget:

Our proposal will be able to expedite development because we will leverage the Joget-Cardano plugin to build a developer / Project owner admin portal that enables the validation and commitment of project resources to the Cardano blockchain.

The Joget-Cardano plugin enables us to build out and maintain this functionality quickly, easily, and economically.

WadaDex|Facilitating Capital Access  : https://www.wadadex.io/

Our Cross-Chain Connector|Search Engine project once built will serve as first contact and one of the many ways that projects are screened and fed into WadaDex to access capital investment.

SDG Rating

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Our Proposal falls within these Sustainable Development Goals:

SDG goals:

Goal 9. Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation

SDG subgoals:

9.1 Develop quality, reliable, sustainable and resilient infrastructure, including regional and transborder infrastructure, to support economic development and human well-being, with a focus on affordable and equitable access for all

9.3 Increase the access of small-scale industrial and other enterprises, in particular in developing countries, to financial services, including affordable credit, and their integration into value chains and markets

9.5 Enhance scientific research, upgrade the technological capabilities of industrial sectors in all countries, in particular developing countries, including, by 2030, encouraging innovation and substantially increasing the number of research and development workers per 1 million people and public and private research and development spending

9.a Facilitate sustainable and resilient infrastructure development in developing countries through enhanced financial, technological and technical support to African countries, least developed countries, landlocked developing countries and small island developing States

Key Performance Indicator (KPI):

9.a.1 Total official international support (official development assistance plus other official flows) to infrastructure

9.3.1 Proportion of small-scale industries in total industry value added

9.5.1 Research and development expenditure as a proportion of GDP

9.5.2 Researchers (in full-time equivalent) per million inhabitants