Unique Network delivered key components of NFT infrastructure, strategic partnerships and on-chain developments that will help us scale mass adoption of NFTs in 2023.

We established several strategic industry partnerships, launched various blockchain products, and initiated several development updates. This year, we co-hosted the Digital Innovation and Digital Art 4 Climate Pavilion at COP27, won the 14th Polkadot Parachain Auction and bought and fractionalized a CryptoPunk. It's impossible to imagine what Unique Network would be like if not for its dedicated builders, community members, open-source contributors, and validators. We're grateful for all the team and community have done on this journey to bring the next generation of NFTs to global audiences.

Here are some resources to get you started if you're just learning about Unique Network. If you're a developer, you can join our Discord server or read our comprehensive technical documentation for a deep dive into the NFT ecosystem. You can also follow us on Twitter for daily updates.

Recapping 2022: Powered with on-chain development, end user products and strategic partnerships

Since we secured a Parachain slot earlier this year, we've made significant technical progress on the ecosystem.

Before we go into more detail, let's review some interesting numbers:

  1. 5000 — The number of supporters who helped Unique Network win the 14th Polkadot Parachain Slot auction.
  2. 7,200 — the number of GitHub commits our team and community have made. (To provide some perspective, the Substrate repository has 7300 commits over its lifetime.)
  3. 8,000 & 212,000 — the amount of NFTs minted on Unique and Quartz, respectively.
  4. 28 — The total number of core releases, minor releases, and servicing updates shipped.
  5. 71,954 — number of Quartz holders.

Technical Developments

Heading into 2022, we had a comprehensive roadmap spanning multiple facets of our ecosystem that we aimed to achieve. Off the back of well-timed updates, Polkadot support, network collaborations, plus team and community support, we’re pleased to say we’ve accomplished virtually all of our objectives.

In 2022 we delivered important milestones for our blockchains Unique and Quartz, including network launches, over 7200 GitHub commits, TGE, and over 10 NFT pallets that make our blockchain among the most advanced NFT chain in the cryptoverse. Simultaneously, we launched SDKs written in JavaScript to realize the vision of mass adoption. This is significant as any web2, mobile or gaming developer can start developing NFT dApps without blockchain knowledge. We’re relentlessly breaking down technical access barriers. Our partnerships like Lemonade social and LiveTree are a testament that our tech can power end-user solutions ready for mass adoption. The other industry pain point we addressed is painless transactions. One NFT mint on the brand new Ethereum 2.0 still releases 45 grams of CO2, while on Unique, this number stands at 0.00012 grams. Our focus on delivering sustainable solutions led us to co-host the Digital Innovation pavilion at COP27, and we launched our perspectives on NFTs ‘Powering Climate Action’. Read on to learn more.

User-Facing Products

1. UniqueMinter and Uniquescan

Along with the Opal Testnet launch, the development team, also deployed UniqueScan (a blockchain explorer and UniqueMinter (an NFT minting tool) to allow creators to test their NFTs on Opal, with Quartz and Unique Network functionality coming soon. Besides serving unique functions, these two products also serve unique purposes. For example, UniqueScan is a search engine—it allows users to search for information on transfers, extrinsic, account balances, and even information about blocks, events, collections, and holders, while UniqueMinter allows users to create NFT collections on Opal.

2. XCM and EVM

Achieving true blockchain interoperability is a fundamental aspect of Unique Network — so integrating XCM facilitates a seamless cross-chain communication flow between Polkadot and Karura (or channels such as Acala, Moonbeam, Statemine, Moonriver, and Statemint) is special.

To draw in even more developers, we made the platform EVM-compatible to create an execution environment suitable for onboarding projects or migrating smart contracts from popular chains such as Ethereum, Polygon, and BSC.

3. Unique SDK

Despite the potential of Web3, it is still in its infancy, there are over 26 million developers worldwide and only 18,000 web3 developers. We know there are certain steps we must take before we ask enterprises to replace their existing infrastructure; for this reason, we’re offering web2 developers a familiar tech stack.

The Unique SDK — a platform-specific application development toolset — was one of our most important roadmap releases. This kit provides a framework for rapid dApp and tool development on the Unique Network blockchain.

Making high-level abstractions for the SDK using publicly accessible Substrate core nodes makes it possible to avoid maintaining library versioning and dependencies, thus achieving the highest availability at the lowest maintenance cost.

With the Unique SDK, web3 dApps can be created by any JavaScript developer in several categories, i.e., NFT marketplaces, NFT games, custom wallets, and tokenization platforms.

(Implementations for Android, C#, and iOS developers coming soon)

Unique Network Pallets

Besides our powerful NFT pallet, we could also add ten other pallets for the network to utilize, each serving a unique purpose. The scheduler pallet, for example, is a module dedicated to scheduling dispatches, while the AppPromotion pallet is the element dedicated to parachain staking.

We'll highlight a few below, but here's a count of the pallets so far; Fungible, Re-fungible, Non-fungible, Structure, Proxy RMRK core, Proxy RMRK equipment, App Promotion, Scheduler, Common, Sponsoring and Unique pallets.

4. Sponsored Transactions

Sponsored transaction staking model is yet another core blockchain release that is as innovative as it is pioneering.

This financially-powered incentivized model uses a combination of inflation and staking to bring in more dApps developers into the ecosystem — generating more fees for the network, which subsequently go back to the Treasury. It also has the added benefit of supporting a new generation of creators by making it easier for them to transition their users into web3.

5. Refungible Tokens (RFTs)

This May — we officially introduced the ability to integrate re-fungibility into NFTs, essentially permitting them to be split and combined and thereby creating a whole new range of possibilities for them. Co-possession of property is an example of a shared ownership arrangement where re-fungibility allows for multiple ownership alternatives, like timeshares and co-ownership between multiple users.

6. Nested NFTs

Technological advancement is happening rapidly, causing an acceleration of change, especially for NFTs. Nested NFTs can establish new token applications and expand token usage far beyond what has been possible before. This concept allows NFT relationships to be created by bundling two or more NFTs hierarchically and sequentially. This application allows creators and collaborators to create and reward unique experiences that inspire long-term user engagement.

Community Events, Press, and Media

Unique Network has benefited from excellent press and media attention, with mentions from leading publications and recognition from the organizers of major in-person and virtual conferences, all of which have led to an increased surge in our community , helped us build strategic relationships and create more use cases for our platform.

We attended and spoke at over to fifty global events, including (but not limited to):

  • Polkadot Technical Summit
  • Consensus by Coindesk 2022
  • Climate Change Conference - COP27
  • NFT NYC 2022
  • BlockDown Croatia 2022
  • Bank of Tomorrow Summit
  • Polkadot Decoded
  • Sustainable Blockchain Summit

Lastly, more than 7,900 community members participated and supported our January token sale with over 5,000 users engaging thereafter with the Unique Crowdloan. Whereas our Huobi token staking was filled in less than three days, with over two million $UNQ staked by the second round of staking.

Partnerships

To further establish long-term success for the network, we created strategic alliances with multiple projects, using the platform’s advanced NFT solutions to build better products. These notable partnerships include Lemonade Social, Unit Masters, Livetree Network, and OG Protocol.

Let's recap.

1. Lemonade Social

As a multichain platform empowering creators to build functional and incentivized web3 communities, Lemonade Social uses Unique Network’s technology to design an advanced NFT ticketing solution to connect communities through event experiences. Since the partnership commenced, Lemonade Social has delivered seven end-user projects, including Unesco Exhibition, Coin Bureau Conference, and Unit Masters, to our blockchain and, by extension, Polkadot. This partnership is supercharging innovation and scale within the DotSama ecosystem.

More on this partnership here.

2. Livetree Network

A web3 social platform focused on empowering creators, Livetree Network will collaborate with Unique to develop technology and community solutions for minting membership tokens, the collective treasury, and converting social posts into NFT collective assets.

More on this partnership here.

3. OG Protocol

Digital art laboratory, OG protocol, and its creator community tap into Unique's advanced features to fashion dynamic NFTs that extend beyond the digital and physical worlds and possess real-world utility.

More on this partnership here.

4. Sovereign Nature Initiative (Hackathon)

Sovereign Nature Initiative (SNI), a non-profit foundation, successfully applied our flexible NFT infrastructure for a hackathon to adjudicate how various ecological conservation and regeneration projects utilized NFTs to tackle issues such as biodiversity conservation and restoration.

More on this partnership here.

5. Co-hosted DigitalArt4Climate Pavilion at COP27 and First Thought-Leadership Paper

Unique Network collaborated with reputable organizations such as IAAI GloCha, Climate Chain Coalition, and UN-Habitat to spotlight our vision to use NFTs and advanced blockchain technology to advance climate-friendly digital technology innovation while delivering sustainable climate change solutions.

You can read more about these leadership insights in our first-ever full leadership paper or watch the Unique Network / Polkadot Hour at the COP27 Digital Innovation Pavilion here.

6. Launched DigitalArt4Climate Marketplace

Soon after our participation at COP27, the launch of DigitalArt4Climate Marketplace was developed to showcase various climate-inspired tokenized artwork. For context, this initiative is a partnership between Unique Network, UN-Habitat, and IAAI GLOCHA to raise funds for climate change by mobilizing youth around the world.

‘Punks for People' Campaign

In June, we launched 'Punks for People', a widely covered campaign that allowed us to purchase and fractionalize Cryptopunk and Substrapunk NFTs into thousands of smaller tokens to distribute value across the blockchain. The campaign's massive success will give over 59,000 users a piece of Cryptopunk #3042 and Substrapunk #6123. Both these fractionalized tokens are bundled into an NFT chest to create a full NFT.

Registration has ended. Steps to claim and distribution will be announced shortly.

Closing Statements

The work will continue in 2023. We intend to make onboarding Web2 and Web3 users through next-generation NFTs as simple as possible while maintaining investments in R&D to continue bringing new and innovative blockchain solutions to the enterprise market. We will also continue to focus on our social responsibility and work hard to positively impact the environments in which we operate.