Helium COO responds to concerns: Will HNT go to zero?

Original Title: 《tl;dr on HIP 70: HNT Ecosystem Would Expand on Solana》

Original Author: Helium COO Frank Mong

Original Translation: 0x214, BlockBeats

On August 31, the core developers of the decentralized wireless communication network Helium initiated the HIP 70 proposal, planning to migrate the network from Helium's custom blockchain to Solana, aiming to improve Helium's speed, stability, and scalability. Helium COO Frank Mong published an article interpreting HIP 70 and addressing community-related questions. BlockBeats has organized and translated this as follows:

Helium's core mission has always been to connect all things and people through an ubiquitous and affordable network. In just three years since its establishment, Helium has achieved considerable accomplishments:

• Helium is the world's largest IoT network, with 943,000 hotspots deployed in 72,000 cities across 182 countries.

• Less than a month ago, Helium launched the MOBILE Token as a reward for 5G hotspots. Subsequently, nearly 4,000 Helium 5G stations were deployed across 48 states in the U.S.

• In August, the number of data packets transmitted over the Helium network approached 100 million.

On August 31, the core developers of the decentralized wireless communication network Helium initiated the HIP 70 proposal, planning to migrate the network from Helium's custom blockchain to Solana. HIP 70 aims to scale Helium to meet the current and future needs of network builders and users, while remaining consistent with the original intent of the Helium project. To achieve this goal, HIP 70 proposes a brand new Proof-of-Coverage (PoC) and data transmission architecture, transitioning from a custom blockchain to the Layer 1 blockchain Solana.

There are many aspects of this proposal worth in-depth interpretation, and this article aims to address community questions related to HIP 70.

What are the attractions of HIP 70? Key highlights:

- Miners/hotspot owners will receive more rewards. This proposal will allow 2 million HNT to return to the reward pool each year, benefiting miners across the entire IoT and 5G networks.

- More mining opportunities. The consistency of the PoC algorithm will be enhanced. Instead of transmitting (beaconing) and witnessing activities every few hours or days, PoC will occur continuously at a frequency of once per hour.

- A more efficient network. Data transmission from devices will achieve faster, more reliable, and higher throughput.

Why choose the Solana blockchain?

When Helium was founded three years ago, the blockchain options available to us were relatively few, and no one could have predicted Helium's astonishing growth rate.

To achieve the new goal of scaling Helium to support more types of networks, the Helium team reassessed the necessity of continuing to maintain the current L1 Helium blockchain. After analyzing multiple blockchains, the core developers chose Solana for large-scale network expansion, while also allowing the core team to focus on supporting the growth of other networks and building more innovative wireless applications.

Three key reasons Helium recommends Solana:

• Helium's core developers will no longer need to maintain the Helium blockchain.

• Solana's vast ecosystem integrates a large number of developers, applications, and teams.

• HNT is natively compatible with other innovative projects in the Solana ecosystem, allowing HNT, MOBILE, and IOT Token holders to gain more use cases.

Network users will receive more support, including hardware wallets and software wallets, DeFi, NFT markets, and compatibility with other applications in the Solana ecosystem.

How will Solana's mobile product stack (Solana Mobile Stack), Saga phone, etc., participate in Helium's future? Helium is also looking forward to this.

Will HNT go to zero?

No. In fact, HNT will play a more important role. HNT will continue to drive all network construction and usage. For example, all networks will require HNT as data credits, such as IoT and 5G networks. As the usage of various networks increases, the value of the HNT ecosystem will also rise.

Can miners receive SOL?

No, HNT, MOBILE, and IOT remain the tokens within the Helium ecosystem. SOL is the native token of the Solana blockchain and is unrelated to HIP 70 and Helium.

Will PoC proof be deprecated?

No, PoC proof will continue to be adopted. HIP 70 aims to make PoC more consistent and reliable for miners.

What is the relationship between MOBILE and HNT? Will it change due to the adoption of Solana?

The relationship between MOBILE and HNT will not change due to the use of the Solana L1 blockchain. 5G hotspot/miner owners will continue to receive MOBILE Tokens as rewards for providing cellular network coverage, and these MOBILE Tokens can be exchanged for HNT.

Will the miners' hotspots be affected?

No. Miners should be able to conduct more stable PoC activities, with transmissions (beaconing) and witnessing occurring every hour. Each year, 2 million HNT will return to the reward pool, benefiting miners across the entire IoT and 5G networks.

Will miners' wallets be affected?

Helium will provide a new version of the Helium Wallet App to support the upgrade. Aside from updating the app, users do not need to do anything. Users can use the same 12 or 24 mnemonic words, but there will be a different public address on the Solana blockchain.

HNT holders will also be able to use other wallets in the Solana ecosystem, such as Phantom or Solflare.

How will existing Helium IoT and 5G networks be affected?

The IoT and 5G networks will continue to grow and expand, while the proposed upgrade architecture in HIP 70 will provide Helium's IoT and 5G networks with greater reliability and better scalability.

HIP 70 mentions a lot about Oracles; what are Oracles?

Oracles are servers that provide off-chain data to blockchains. For Helium, Oracles will provide PoC activity and data transmission information to the Solana blockchain to accurately allocate token rewards.

What tasks do Oracles perform?

Currently, PoC proof and data transmission transactions are processed on the Helium blockchain. HIP 70 proposes to move this to Oracles to simplify the overall architecture and ensure data continues to flow, even if the blockchain itself is offline, allowing hotspots to participate in PoC proof.

It is important to note that Oracles do not run on Solana. Oracles are independent infrastructure separate from the blockchain to enhance resilience and performance. Even if Solana experiences temporary outages or spikes in gas fees, the Oracles will not be affected.

What if Solana stops producing blocks or experiences temporary outages?

Using Oracles helps maintain data flow on Helium, even in the event of Solana stopping block production or experiencing temporary outages.

What will happen to Validators?

Validators are entities on the Helium blockchain that issue challenges, validate transactions, and add new blocks to the blockchain. With the Oracles and HIP 70 proposal, the work done by Validators will no longer be necessary.

However, Validators can redeploy their staked HNT to veHNT (vote-escrowed HNT), which is a new governance token across all Helium networks. veHNT gives holders voting rights on key decisions in the Helium ecosystem and allows them to earn IOT and MOBILE Tokens (which can be exchanged for HNT). Additionally, Validators can choose to unstake after a 5-month cooldown period.

After HIP 70 passes, can HNT still be staked?

Yes. Any HNT holder can stake HNT in the form of veHNT. Unlike current Validators, HNT holders can stake any amount of HNT, with no minimum limit. Depending on the length of the staking period, they can earn voting rights and token rewards.

More details about veHNT can be found in the HIP 51 proposal.

How many users are using Helium IoT?

In August, a total of 97 million data packets flowed through the Helium IoT network, including GPS location tracking, air quality monitoring, temperature sensors, etc. You can view user samples.

Building hardware is not easy. Creating practical and reliable products and applications requires both time and financial support. The Helium community spent three years building the first existing wireless network, which only truly launched 6-9 months ago. Over time, more products and applications supporting Helium will enter the market, driving overall network usage.

Will IoT data transmission be affected?

The proposed data transmission architecture in HIP 70 will provide a more reliable, scalable, and accessible platform, allowing anyone to use existing LoRaWAN Network Servers (LNS), such as ChirpStack, The Things Stack, or AWS to utilize the Helium network.

How will new LoRaWAN devices join the network?

Before the new architecture is ready, there is no need to change how devices join. Once the new architecture is fully implemented, users will have more choices regarding which LoRaWAN Network Server (LNS) to use and how to join devices.

When will HIP 70 be voted on?

The Helium Foundation will hold a community vote on the HIP 70 proposal from September 12 to September 18. For more related details, you can participate in the Twitter Space on September 7 at 9:00 am for further information.