Interview: For KYVE, Advancement In Tech Is The Focus, Not Hype

Going by the standard of successful technology start-ups, KYVE has an impressive scorecard. In about two years, the firm whose goal is to make on- and off-chain data available through solutions that make data archiving, validating and retrieving easy and fast, has raised $13 million dollars in funds and integrated with over 20 blockchains - while also attracting more than 43,000 unique users during its incentivised testnet.

As KYVE launches on mainnet, co-founder Fabian Riewe, in an interview with Arweave News describes the support the firm has received as thrilling and the trajectory of its growth as filled with lessons. One of the lessons, Riewe says, is to ”stay focused on the tech…prioritise innovation and development over hype or other distractions”.

Beyond technology, responding to users’ needs has played a significant role in KYVE’s growth. KYVE’s investment in the creation of an academy that educates people on its tools and processes as well as Web3 will expand the project’s reach and contribute to the growth and adoption of Web3.

Arweave News: KYVE has come full circle or matured in innovation and technology since it launched in early 2021, what has the journey been like and what important lessons would you say the team has learned over time that contributed to the success of the mainnet launch?

Fabian Riewe: KYVE has definitely come a long way since its start in early 2021. Our journey started out all-Arweave, then went to smart contracts, and finally settled on the Cosmos SDK, launching our own Layer 1 blockchain. Each step of the way has been a learning experience for our team, providing important insights that have contributed to the success of KYVE’s mainnet launch.

One of the most important lessons that we’ve learned so far is to stay focused on the tech. We’ve always prioritised innovation and development over hype or other distractions, making sure to keep our true intentions at heart. We’ve also learned to listen to our users and to be responsive to their needs, which has helped us to create a network that is user-friendly and meets the demands of the community.

We’re very proud of what we’ve accomplished so far and of the innovative and technical advancements that have characterised our path. Overall, it’s been a really great journey, and we’re excited to see what the future holds for KYVE as we continue to innovate and grow our network.

Arweave News: The last few weeks have been busy for KYVE. You have launched a series of programmes and features that have culminated in the mainnet. One of them is Kaon. Why is it important for KYVE to have a mainnet testnet? Is it a matter of industry standard? What is KYVE trying to prevent by first launching on ‘mainnet testnet’? Are you not concerned that it would take long to ship updates and features to mainnet if you first have to launch on mainnet testnet?

Fabian Riewe: Building trustless data solutions requires stability and maximal security. By having a testnet and devnet network for mainnet, we’re able to ensure exactly that for our network.

We started out with Korellia i.e our devnet, providing the perfect testing ground for the main features and implementations, hosting our incentivised testnet for thorough testing. Now as our devnet, developers have the chance to bring their integration to maturity.

Then we launched Kaon, our official testnet, which is as close to mainnet as possible to provide the perfect staging environment for all that’s to be pushed onto mainnet. This is important to be sure we can expect the unexpected and avoid any issues.

Although launching on testnet first may make the process longer, it’s necessary to prevent unexpected issues from occurring on mainnet. We are also continuously working on improving our testing frameworks to improve the time to market for future updates and features.

Arweave News: You recently launched KYVE Academy. As far as we know, this is one of the first initiatives by an Arweave-based project and the community seems to welcome the project; 400 people signed up for the course in 24 hours. How does the idea of the academy fit into or advance the general interest and core of KYVE’s vision?

Fabian Riewe: Since our start, we’ve noticed the lack of resources for not only blockchain technology in general but also the major issues KYVE is solving. Sharing our knowledge has always played a large role in building up our community and user base, so releasing our own Academy was just a natural next step.

Today with almost 3k students taking our courses, we’re very pleased to see it’s a success and people want to learn more. Now with mainnet live, our community can feel more confident in their understanding around KYVE and their participation in the network.

Arweave News: Your partnership with Finoa which is said to be Europe’s leading institutional crypto custodian drew some attention from the ecosystem. We know that this will usher in institutional money but how specifically will this impact the $KYVE?

Fabian Riewe: One of the key advantages of partnering with Finoa is that it provides institutional players with a secure, reliable, and user-friendly custodian for their crypto assets. By offering a safe place for institutional players to store and manage their tokens, KYVE is better able to cater to one of our core token holders.

Moreover, the partnership with Finoa will make the process of using KYVE easier for institutional players, which will drive adoption rates. KYVE is very B2B focused, and institutional players are a significant part of its user base.

Arweave News: When juxtaposed with individual users of your service, what is the rationale behind bringing institutional custody onboard?

Fabian Riewe: Individual users of KYVE have full control over their tokens and can store them using Ledger or other cold wallets. However, Finoa also offers the option for individual users to onboard if they prefer to use their custody services. This provides users with flexibility and the ability to choose the custody solution that best fits their needs.

Arweave News: Since its launch, KYVE has been existing for almost two years. In terms of figures, stats and other things that will make up your scorecard, how will you say KYVE has impacted Web3?

Fabian Riewe: Throughout our development we have gained a lot of amazing support from top L1s in Web3, major VCs, our growing community, and more. So far, we have raised over $13M in funding and partnered with NEAR, Cosmos, Polkadot, Solana, and more.

This past year we also launched our incentivised testnet, which got over 43k unique users participating and aiding our team in testing out KYVE’s main features and overall network security. While on testnet, we also launched over 20 different integrations with top blockchains in the space, showcasing KYVE’s different use case possibilities.

Regarding our community, from 2021 to 2022, we saw a 368.34% growth in Twitter followers and a 24.20% peak engagement rate. We also grew 40% on Telegram, 304% on Youtube, 686% on Discord, and 964% on Medium. As well as local community groups covering over 15 different languages across the globe.

Overall, we’re thrilled with the support we’ve gained so far and the reach we have made in the space. With mainnet now live, we will be pushing to grow our ecosystem and use cases. We’re just getting started growing and spreading word about KYVE to help bring our solution to all data users, easing their overall experience and scalability.

Arweave News: In the mainnet era, what should users expect?

Fabian Riewe: Now with mainnet live, users can look forward to our next steps which include the official token listing and the imminent launch of our protocol layer. The protocol layer will fully unlock KYVE’s capabilities, bringing forward a truly trustless, user-friendly solution for all who work with data. In the end, we aim to have KYVE be integrated into all projects as a crucial part of the Web3 stack, solving Web3’s major data roadblocks and hazards for developing projects and driving innovation across the whole space.