PeakChain Uber on Cardano

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem.

We aim to develop a Cardano ridesharing solution like Uber but on the blockchain, guaranteeing privacy and security in the services provided, as well as being fully governed by users of the platform.

[GENERAL] Summarize your relevant experience.

• More than 5 years of experience working on connected Car Projects alongside Germany's world-leading car makers
• More than 10 years of experience in Software Development
• More than 8 years of experience in Software Quality Assurance and Test Automation
• Plutus pioneers

[IMPACT] Please describe your proposed solution.

Market size of Ridesharing/ridehailing like uber

Ridesharing/ridehailing companies like Uber offer a significant mobility solution for millions of global users.

The market size of ridesharing services is increasing worldwide: in 2021, this was 58 billion USD, to an estimated 185 billion USD in 2026 [1].

The demand for cost and time effective mobility solutions justifies the massive number of ridesharing users. These figures are estimated at more than half a billion in 2021; meanwhile, users of such services are spread across 85 countries. [2]

Drawbacks of current centralized Solutions

1-   Privacy issues:

Sensitive user data like travel trajectory and personal data could be tracked or abused by the service provider. However, through the use of the Blockchain, all user data will be hashed and remain safe. This means only permitted actors have the right to decode such data using their private keys.

2-   Security challenges

User data is stored in centralized servers, which leaves it open to hacking or manipulation. But a decentralized solution will address this issue. In fact, the Cardano blockchain, as a platform, and by design, will ensure the security of this mobility solution: there is no single point of failure.

3-   High fees:

Users are paying high fees to service providers. Still, the impact of these fees could be lessened through a decentralized solution.

In fact, most blockchain industry DApps represent serious competition to similar centralized solutions. This is due to cutting centralized management and governance costs, as well as the business model transparency.

4-   Governance:

The problem of all Web2 solutions, such as Uber, is that they are managed by centralized entities. Sadly, this can lead to an abuse of power and the enforcement of any rule changes without warning – this could include, for example, fee changes.

Blockchain solutions mean we can build decentralized solutions which could be governed exclusively by the service users. So, users could suggest improvements in the platform. Such improvements should be formulated in an improvement proposal and voted by the community.

Building the Solution:

We will build the entire solution:

1-   Building the platform:

Using our experience as a software development company, we can comfortably conceptualize and build any Web Application. We will design the solution architecture and build both the web application and apps (Android/iOS).

2-   Conceptualize the economic model:

Looking at present centralized ridesharing solutions, we will look to create and deploy an economic model that provides true value and competitivity to users—one way we will do this is through a Cardano native token. The project’s first phase will, therefore, propel users to utilize the platform, as well as refer other users, expanding the customer base.

Ultimately, we plan to ideate and then develop the solution’s Tokenomics. Then, we will host discussions with our community concerning whether to pursue an ICO or ISPO. This will only happen when the technical capabilities have been readied.

3-   Building the community and Marketing activities

Building the community is one major success factor of the solution. We will focus on building a sustainable community by incentivizing users and solution contributors.

4-   Test the solution with real users

Upon completing the technical solution, we will proceed to test through various global users, beginning with our location in Germany. We will incentivize the first testers and users of the solution and communicate the testing experience and reports, and marketing campaigns. 

5-   Embed the Hardware to assure the decentralization of the solution

Once the hardware device described in the proposal is ready, https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/414249, we will integrate it with the platform to assure the decentralization of the solution.

Connected Car Blockchain Solutions MUST be genuine Web3 solutions

The blockchain solutions for the automotive sector must be real Web3 decentralized solutions. Furthermore, no centralized servers should interrupt the vehicle data that is transmitted to the Blockchain.

Unfortunately, currently, several Blockchain solutions are claiming to be real Web3 solutions. Still, the truth is that such solutions are fully centralized and utilize Web2 that is masked behind Web3 marketing. These tools are managed by centralized entities. Moxie Marlinspike’s recent blog post dives further into this problem in the blockchain industry using concrete examples [3].

Meanwhile, though, PeakChain is focusing on configuring a genuine Web3 outcome for the vehicle industry. This way, centralized servers cannot be hacked or interfered with. At the same time, there will be no centralized entity management.

References

[1] https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/mobility-on-demand-market-198699113.html#:~:text=%5B221%20Pages%20Report%5D%20The%20global,USD%20185.1%20billion%20by%202026

[2] https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/ridesharing-market

[3] Moxie Marlinspike, "My first impressions of web3", https://moxie.org/2022/01/07/web3-first-impressions.html, "Jan 07, 2022".

[IMPACT] Please describe how your proposed solution will address the Challenge that you have submitted it in.

As a sector, mobility is one of the world’s largest, fastest-growing. This is indicated by market size and the increasing user numbers.

We are homing in on a huge target audience by building a ridesharing solution on Cardano. In fact, as mentioned previously, the number of ridesharing users is estimated by more than half a billion in 2021, and the user base is spread in over 85 countries. [2] As such, there is expected to be significantly increased demand in the number of Cardano Wallets and transactions, as well as the demand of ADA. The Cardano native Token, used to pay fees, will create this huge demand for ADA.

Ultimately, this will lead to increased demand for the Cardano blockchain and boost both retail and institutional adoption.

[IMPACT] What are the main risks that could prevent you from delivering the project successfully and please explain how you will mitigate each risk?

1.Main Challenges:

There are three main challenges

• Presently, many startups are merging without any recognized, formal and established legal entity offering full transparency. Consequently, team members sometimes have no experience in the market in which they are operating, meaning they have unproven experience.
• Most innovative projects fail to deliver on time and have an excessive time to market.
• Most projects focus on delivering features, often choosing to skip software quality assurance efforts, assuming that the cost of quality is higher than the cost of non-conformance.

2.Our Strategy to mitigate the risks:

2.1. Building Trust:

• Our expert team has significant experience, working on Connected Car Projects in the automobile industry for extensive periods.
• We are a transparent legal entity, a company called PeakSoft GmbH based in Wuppertal, Germany. For many years, we have been dedicated to delivering software development and software quality/test automation solutions.
• For more information about PeakSoft GmbH, the company forming PeakChain, please check our website: https://peak-soft.de/
• For more information about the company legal information, please check this link: https://peak-soft.de/impressum/

2.2. Short Time to Market:

• Our Strategy is to build and deliver high-tech, effective solutions through an incremental agile process. Our team, collectively, possesses technical and management experience
• We have developed an initial prototype with the infrastructure we need to succeed. In this way, we can concentrate on building impactful features and accelerating our deliveries.
• Agile Software Development methods will be used to manage our project, in particular with a focus on Scrum. Sprint period iteration will last two weeks Agile Software Development methods will decrease time to market while accelerating the pace of development by focusing on delivering plug-and-play features within short increments, without having a detrimental outcome on quality.

2.3. "Highly" Prioritizing Quality

• Short time to market doesn't mean delivering features and hindering quality. We are ISTQB Certified, offering outstanding experience in software quality assurance and test automation. Consequently, quality will be our main focus.

• We plan to utilize ISTQB as a standard to ensure our quality. A dedicated test concept containing details of the software quality assurance process will be formed in the project.

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed plan, including timeline and key milestones for delivering your proposal.

Please check all acceptance criteria of the project, roadmap, team, and budget under this Link:

FEASIBILITY SPREADSHEET

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_DSXCxeZezbaVTHWHENLTH7nxqfrzNVf/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=115765945842863689790&rtpof=true&sd=true

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed budget breakdown.

Please check all acceptance criteria of the project, roadmap, team, and budget under this Link:

FEASIBILITY SPREADSHEET

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_DSXCxeZezbaVTHWHENLTH7nxqfrzNVf/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=115765945842863689790&rtpof=true&sd=true

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide details of the people who will work on the project.

1.PeakChain Team:

Below is a list of all employees of PeakSoft GmbH. All team members are living and working in Germany:

• Oussama Benmahmoud

• CEO and Co-Founder of PeakSoft GmbH
• Industrial Engineer
• Project Management and Software Quality Assurance
• +5 years Experience in Connected Car Projects by Volkswagen
• +8 years experience in Software Quality and Test Automation
• Plutus Pioneer
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/oussama-benmahmoud-43693926/
• Twitter: @Oussbenma

• Abderrahim Issaoui

• CTO and Co-Founder of PeakSoft GmbH
• +10 years experience as a Software Engineer
• Plutus Pioneer
• Experience as Lead Frontend Developer
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/abderrahim-issaoui-b3149227/
• Twitter: @AbderrahimAiss

• Habib Mokni

• Software Engineer
• Frontend Developer
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/habibmokni/

• Mohammed Abdelali

• Electronic and Communication Engineer
• Software Quality Assurance Specialist
• +5 years Experience in Connected Car Projects by Volkswagen
• +8 years experience in Software Quality
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mohammed-abdelali-290b7b101/

• Neyla Issaoui

• Project Management Office
• Responsible for Administration, Accounting and Coordination Tasks
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neyla-issaoui-266534199/

• Ramla Mahjoub

• Project Management Office
• Responsible for Administration, Accounting and Coordination Tasks
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ramla-mahjoub-25a1843b/

2. Project Roles:

2.1. Project Management:

• Oussama Benmahmoud

o Certified Project Management Professional (PMP)®

o Certified ITIL® - IT Service Management - Foundation Level

o Certified Professional Scrum Master™ I (PSM I)

o Certified Professional Scrum Master™ I (PSM I)

2.2. Plutus Blockchain Development

• Abderrahim Issaoui: Plutus Pioneer
• Oussama Benmahmoud: Plutus Pioneer

2.3. Frontend Development

• Abderrahim Issaoui

• Lead Frontend Engineer
• More than 10 years of experience in Software Development Projects
• Experience as Lead Frontend Development
• Professional Scrum Master (PSM1)
• Microsoft Certified Professional
• CCNA 1 & CCNA 2
• Microsoft Technology Associate: Software Development Fundamentals

• Habib Mokni

o Frontend Engineer

2.4. Connected Car Hardware Components and integration:

• Mohammed Abdelali

More than 5 years of experience in Connected Car Projects with Volkswagen

• Oussama Benmahmoud

More than 5 years of experience in Connected Car Projects with Volkswagen

2.5. Software Quality Assurance:

• Mohammed Abdelali:

o More than 8 years of experience experience in Software Quality Assurance

o Certified ISTQB Foundation Level

• Oussama Benmahmoud

• More than 8 years of experience experience in Software Quality Assurance
• Certified:
• ISTQB Foundation Level
• ISTQB® Certified Tester – Foundation Level, Extension Agile Tester
• ISTQB® Certified Tester – Advanced Level – Test Analyst
• ISTQB® Certified Tester – Advanced Level – Technical Test Analyst

2.6. Administration, Accounting and Coordination Tasks

• Neyla Issaoui

• Ramla Mahjoub

[FEASIBILITY] If you are funded, will you return to Catalyst in a later round for further funding? Please explain why / why not.

We will return to catalyst in later rounds for further funding to implement further features of the platform

[FEASIBILITY] Are you or any member of your team working on any other proposals in this Fund9?

[FEASIBILITY] Are you or your team working on any other proposals from previous Funds?

[AUDITABILITY] Please describe what you will measure to track your project's progress, and how will you measure these?

1.Using Agile Software Development Methods:

• Agile Software Development methods will be used to manage our project, in particular with a focus on Scrum. Sprint period iteration will last two weeks
• Agile Software Development methods will decrease the time to market and accelerate the development pace. This will be achieved by focusing on delivering plug-and-play features within short increments without detrimentally impacting quality.
• Scrum will significantly increase the transparency and auditability of the project progress status and its deliverables.
• A Scrum board will be created in Atlassian JIRA Tool to track the project's progress.
• Product Backlog, including the planned tasks in user stories, will also be created in Atlassian JIRA Tool.
• After the Sprint Review meeting, a Sprint Reports will be created, including relevant KPIs and the accomplished user stories

2.Defining clear acceptance criteria for the project components and deliverables:

We have ideated and subsequently implemented clear acceptance criteria. Within these criteria, we will successfully deliver within six months the first product increment.

Consequently, acceptance criteria will be reworked in the form of user stories and entered in the product backlog as to-dos.

Please check all acceptance criteria of the project, roadmap, team, and budget under this Link:

FEASIBILITY SPREADSHEET

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_DSXCxeZezbaVTHWHENLTH7nxqfrzNVf/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=115765945842863689790&rtpof=true&sd=true

[AUDITABILITY] What does success for this project look like?

As described in the previous Section, "Auditability", we have ideated and subsequently implemented clear acceptance criteria. Within these criteria, we will successfully deliver within 6 months the first product increment.

Consequently, acceptance criteria will be reworked in the form of user stories and entered in the product backlog as to-dos.

Success criteria mean effectively completing the stories outlined in each sprint and delivering the first increment of the product, as well as successfully fulfilling all described acceptance criteria.

Please check all acceptance criteria of the project, roadmap, team, and budget under this Link:

FEASIBILITY SPREADSHEET

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_DSXCxeZezbaVTHWHENLTH7nxqfrzNVf/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=115765945842863689790&rtpof=true&sd=true

If you would like to read a summary of our projects, please check the blog post below:

https://medium.com/peakchain

To prove our commitment and engagement, and our contribution on the cardano network and its decentralization, we are running a staking pool called: PeakChain Pool, Ticker [PKCP]

For more information about our staking pool, please check its website:

https://www.peakchain-pool.com/

[AUDITABILITY] Please provide information on whether this proposal is a continuation of a previously funded project in Catalyst or an entirely new one.

New Proposal