PolkaIDO Launchpad: Overview

Find out why Polkadex’s launchpad is a game-changer for IDOs

Polkadex is not only the Orderbook DEX. It’s going to be a whole ecosystem with various functionalities! One of the most exciting features for the blockchain teams and community is our very own launchpad — PolkaIDO.

With blockchain disrupting virtually every industry and cryptocurrencies having another crazy year, “launchpad” and “IDO” have become some of the hottest words in the crypto world. Why is that the case?

The new demand has led to an explosion in the number of new blockchain projects. In turn, this has led to an increase in new users who want to invest in tokens early on and make the most out of the project’s growth.

What are Launchpad and IDO?

Launchpad is the platform for conducting and taking part in the IDO that stands for Initial DEX Offering. This is one of the main events in the life of the project’s token and a big stage in the company’s investment strategy.

Blockchain projects take time, skilled team and effort to create and broadcast to the world. Hence, it is impossible to finance any project in crypto from the team’s own pocket. Securing funds in crypto is done in stages: Seed, Strategic, Private and Community.

IDO is part of the Community round and is similar to crowdfunding. Community participants receive a chance to buy the project’s token at a fixed price before it goes to the market, where price will be dictated purely by supply and demand. When tokens go to market, they usually increase in price quite a lot in the first hours or days of trading already.

Sounds like a dream, right? However, IDOs and launchpads in the current state are very difficult both to get in and to navigate.

What is wrong with Launchpads and IDOs now?

Participating in the IDO requires a lot of time, patience and manual work both from the project teams and investors.

The most common issues with the current state of token distribution platforms are:

⚫️ Modern launchpads are more centralized than decentralized. This means that teams have to do a lot of work manually and collaborate with external parties to help with user verification and other activities, which comes at a cost. For example, teams have to go through selecting users who will be lottery winners manually. This in turn adds another layer — users have to trust the team to randomize the selection.

⚫️ Currently, a majority of the launchpads are based on the Ethereum network, where each action is expensive. Whitelisting and executing smart contracts to distribute tokens on the Ethereum network comes at a very steep price. That’s a big financial load on a young team trying to get started with the ir project.

⚫️ From the investor’s side, IDOs become less and less attainable for an average retail investor. The reason is that IDO investors are required to hold a large number of launchpad native tokens in order to participate in the IDOs. In this case, all the cards are in favour of the early supporters of the platforms. If you are new to crypto or simply don’t want to spend a few thousand on launchpad tokens, you can’t join the IDOs. Moreover, holding a certain amount of tokens does not guarantee you an allocation with some platforms.

Why PolkaIDO is different?

Polkadex’s IDO launchpad solves these problems by being fully on the blockchain! Whitelisting, distributing tokens, vesting — from the first step to the last. Our main goal is to simplify the process and make it as transparent as possible both for blockchain project teams and IDO investors.

As we had our IDO a few months ago, let’s start from the benefits of PolkaIDO for blockchain project teams while the memory is still fresh 😉

PolkaIDO is a fully on-chain, one-stop-shop solution for all token generation activities; from conducting the fundraise to listing tokens on Polkadex exchange. The Polkadex IDO platform will be the easiest way to deploy tokens and distribute them among IDO participants. For teams, Polkadex launchpad will be an end-to-end product allowing them to create tokens, bridge them to other networks, list them on Polkadex Orderbook, conduct IDO investment rounds and, finally, migrate their tokens to their own blockchains later on in the project’s development.

PolkaIDO will also cut the costs for project teams setting up and auditing smart contracts. It will be plug-and-play with configurable parameters like token support, vesting schedule and more.

Listing of projects’ tokens on Polkadex Orderbook will also be a less costly alternative to expenses for centralized exchanges since it will be handled by on-chain governance.

Moreover, project teams will get the opportunity to mint and burn ERC-20 compatible tokens.

The fact that the Polkadex IDO platform will be fully on-chain makes the experience beneficial for retail investors as well.

First of all, forget about astronomic gas fees users currently have to pay to claim their tokens, which have turned the IDO process into a ‘gas war’. Polkadex will use on-chain randomness that is free and fair for all the participants.

In this respect, we also took the fees for participation into account and tried to make them affordable for anyone.

Polkadex removes the entry barrier for participants who generally need to hold large amounts of the IDO platform’s native tokens to try their luck in IDOs. Instead, we will offer participants the option to pay a one-time platform fee that will go to the on-chain treasury or be burned every 6 months so that users can participate in projects of their choosing.

We are coming up with a dynamic algorithm that links the number of PDEX needed to participate to that which will automatically burn the tokens exceeding 20M inflation. The goal is to keep inclusivity even when the price of PDEX increases, unlike on other platforms. We don’t have an exact number needed for participation in IDOs on Polkadex, but we will announce it closer to PolkaIDO’s launch.

On-chain randomness will also help us in picking the lottery winners. Since projects conducting IDOs distribute a limited number of tokens, the allocation for each IDO will be lottery-based and driven by the on-chain algorithm. This levels the playing field for all participants and helps to eliminate typical complaints on traditional IDO platforms favouring certain investors over others.

Finally, through on-chain governance, Polkadex users will also have a say in the selection process for IDOs and further project listings on Polkadex Orderbook.

Tokens will go through a careful curation process beforehand. Initially, Polkadex will allow for ERC-20 tokens compatible with Ethereum and native Substrate based tokens compatible with the Polkadot ecosystem. As the Polkadex ecosystem develops, our on-chain governance will fund teams building bridges to other blockchains and, consequently, allow listings for their tokens.

Possibilities are nearly limitless for PolkaIDO. We aim to release the Testnet version of PolkaIDO in the next few weeks.

Keep an eye on our announcement channels for exact dates and detailed information:

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