A Revealing Look at TON Ecosystem Growth: Backed by Asian Developer Resources and the Telegram Ecosystem

Original source: Howard X account

Author: Howard (Head of Developer Relations for the TON Foundation in Asia)

Compilation: Golem, Odaily Planet Daily

Summary:

• TON is still in its early stages and has not yet reached the "real money" phase. However, the flywheel effect has already formed, especially compared to other L1 networks, and the moat of the TON blockchain itself has been strengthened, including payments, mini-program applications, and an increasing number of network users. TON is experiencing network compounding effects.
• Asia is an undervalued region in many aspects (most people agreed on this before TON became popular this year), particularly in terms of talent resources for mini-program development. However, during my 9 months at the TON Foundation, I believe there are still not many local investors or companies. This also means there are huge opportunities for VCs here.
• Due to the enormous demand in the Telegram mini-program ecosystem, Telegram usernames will become the most valuable NFTs and assets in crypto history. Telegram Stars will become the most successful entry point from Web2 to Web3, bringing billions of dollars to the TON network. This will lead to true mass adoption: more users joining and more convenient ways to purchase digital goods.
• More importantly, 99% of people are focused on mini-programs and click-to-earn or tap-to-earn projects. However, the real potential of TON and Telegram lies in their DeFi and social integration capabilities. In the second half of 2024, TON is likely to see growth in DeFi and other chain applications, with metrics such as TVL, transaction volume, and on-chain user numbers expected to increase.

TON / Telegram Network

Currently, most people are only focused on mini-programs on TON. They overlook the bigger picture of the TON blockchain, which includes smart contracts, a DNS system, over 100k TPS, and the most easily convertible user base, supported by Telegram's 900 million users.

The following structure can help us understand the relationship between Telegram and TON:

• Telegram: The messaging layer that connects everyone, with usernames as unique IDs.
• Wallet: The bridge between messaging and cryptocurrency, connecting users and making it easy for everyone to access cryptocurrency.
• TON Blockchain: The asset layer for building financial systems and other decentralized, permissionless functions and businesses.

Why Hasn't TON Succeeded Yet?

The TON blockchain still has low transaction richness and lacks a surge of large DApps for the following reasons:

1. Building a small application to acquire users is much easier than investing a lot of time training smart contract developers. At least in terms of time and financial investment, it is more efficient;
2. Due to the scarcity of DApps on the TON blockchain, there are not many open-source projects to reference or replicate;
3. More importantly, the smart contract language itself is too difficult to learn (FunC language), while Tact language is simpler and has recently had significant updates.

To address these issues from the top down, we (the TON Foundation) and the developer relations team are committed to bridging these gaps. We will create more tutorials and templates and promote more public resources to help projects better develop on TON.

Of course, we know that Rome wasn't built in a day.

Source: https://t.me/tondev_zh

Fortunately, our developer ecosystem has seen significant growth. More importantly, the recent success of "Tap-to-Earn" projects and the integration of USDT on TON have greatly accelerated TON's application.

Developer-related resources:

• Howard's developer guide can be referenced here: https://ton-org.notion.site/Developer-Guideline-by-Howard-024429d0b28c409f992d238057b60f4f
• https://blog.ton.org/deep-dive-into-usdt-on-ton
• https://ton.org/dev

How Does Tap-to-Earn Change the Telegram Ecosystem?

Based on the first point in the previous section about why TON hasn't succeeded, it is clear that most teams prefer to invest in high-return projects and quickly accumulate users. This makes sense for any internet company. As a result, millions of users are using "Tap-to-Earn" or "click-based products" in the Telegram and TON ecosystems. Here are some data points:

• Hamster: 48 million subscribers
• Tapswap: 25 million subscribers
• Blum: 15 million subscribers
• Telegram Tips: 11 million subscribers
• Yescoin: 9.8 million subscribers
• Pixelverse: 9.2 million subscribers
• Notcoin: 8.3 million subscribers
• MemeFi: 8 million subscribers

Source: https://tgstat.com/ratings/channels

This is a great example of how cryptocurrency drives user adoption, not only in terms of subscriber numbers but also because almost all of the top 8 Telegram channels are related to cryptocurrency (except for the 4th, Telegram Tips).

Hamster's subscriber count increased from 1 million on April 15 to 48 million on June 30. This growth rate is faster than any DAU I have seen. It might even surpass the number of new users Binance.com gained at the end of 2017 by riding the hype of altcoins. My point is: "In the past, people had no motivation to join public channels. But now they do."

Still think cryptocurrency can't change the world? It has greatly changed the Telegram ecosystem and the way people behave within it.

The reasoning is simple: the value of crypto is becoming easier to monetize. Since Notcoin was listed on mainstream CEXs, it has created more expectations, attracting more users into the Telegram ecosystem and encouraging them to engage more, such as subscribing to channels and clicking games.

This is a good example of how we are gradually transitioning to a Web2.5-Web3 business logic with stronger economic value, network effects, and the best user experience. Moreover, the barriers created by previous network effects will, in turn, benefit the TON blockchain and user experience, fostering the birth of more successful projects and attracting more projects to join.

How Far Can We Go?

Fortunately, I believe we are still in the early stages, and there is much more to explore in the Telegram network and other areas. Here are some points:

1. The subscriber count of the Hamster channel compared to the total monthly active users (MAU) of Telegram is 48 million / 900 million, accounting for only 5.3%. If we compare this with mass adoption, we are still in the early stages.

2. Nevertheless, this is just basic math. More critically, what is the "penetration rate"? How many TApps are based on DeFi? How many users in Telegram have on-chain wallets? These are the main metrics I care about most.

Once again, we are still in a very, very early stage.

Mass-adoption / The Chasm Theory

The Network is Experiencing Compounding Effects

Rapid advancement must possess network effects. The large number of users in Telegram channels, combined with the listing of Notcoin and the integration of USDT, has enhanced the overall compounding effect.

At the same time, the flywheel effect is spreading. While I cannot provide specific numbers on how many projects have submitted proposals to us or how many messages I have received on Telegram, public data shows that the first wave of momentum has formed, and further growth and effects could happen at any time.

To ensure this article remains readable and not overly lengthy, here are some potential topics I should expand on shortly:

• On-chain data: Reasons for the increase in TVL on the TON blockchain and the increase in on-chain user numbers.
• USDT supply: What is driving the increase in the total supply of USDT, and what is the next module we can build on TON?
• Tap-to-Earn projects: How these projects are transforming into new business models, and what are the business models for these types of "traffic-driven products"?

Overall, I believe our network effects have formed a foothold on the TON blockchain. Furthermore, the path from 0 to 1 has been completed, and we should now focus on moving from 1 to 100+.

About the Impact on Asia

We have seen many companies successfully based on the "Super App" theory, such as WeChat, Alipay, Zalo, Grab, and Line Messenger.

Super App Theory

Taking WeChat as an example, it not only has millions of users but also provides a platform for thousands of developers. Here are some of my key points:

Asian developers are already familiar with mobile-driven markets. Many case studies can be found in the WeChat mini-program rankings—they know what to build.

Due to the slowdown of the Chinese economy, more and more teams and studios are seeking overseas opportunities to increase profits and revenue, such as TikTok, Temu, and Taobao—they want to survive and are eager to find opportunities.

Given the above points, let's focus on the data and check the projects, brands, or companies that can be found so far through the Open League. First, the Open League (@TONOpenLeague) competition uses an SDK to track each visit/open of Tapps. This makes cheating or faking numbers very difficult.

The Open League provides liquidity rewards for quality projects, which can be roughly divided into NFTs, applications, meme coins, etc. More details can be found at the following link: https://blog.ton.org/the-open-league-season-4-results-new-champions-emerge

Similarly, these are all based on personal opinions and do not represent the views of any entity or foundation regarding projects or issues. These views may be based on my personal opinions, past collaborative experiences, or impressions from the offline events we held in Asia over the past nine months.

The Impact on Asia

From the charts above, we can see that many projects are very good at marketing and attracting user attention. However, most of them face the "cold start" problem because they are primarily skilled at operating on platforms like WeChat and Weibo, rather than X. But with the emergence of more "Tap-to-Earn" projects, project teams can easily enter the market and gain early users (referencing the network effects mentioned in the previous section), and with the help of Telegram ads and other tools, the situation becomes smoother. However, we still face some issues:

• How do we define projects that purely belong to Asia? Did they succeed because they leveraged unique advantages in Asia? What types of projects are Asian teams particularly good at?
• If I have an idea and have built an MVP product, who else can I seek support from besides the resources of the TON Foundation (e.g., Grants or Ton Ventures)?
• Which teams are truly focused on Asia and genuinely believe in the Super App theory, willing to fully invest in TON? How can I help them?

Although we have some clear ideas indicating that we can effectively build an ecosystem in Asia, this ecosystem still lacks outstanding companies to reinvest in it. "Until the prices changed in recent months"—this seems to be a long-standing issue, similar to the early Ethereum ecosystem being unpopular in China: being an early investor and publicly advocating for it is very challenging.

I have seen many successful projects rooted in Asia, such as Catizen, Yescoin, Tonano, 852 Web3, SquidTG, Bitget Wallet, okx Wallet, Gate Web3 Wallet, Kenetic, Mechanism Capital, Folius Ventures, and so on.

While preparing this article, the most obvious question that came to my mind is, "It seems that not many investors genuinely care about or invest in Asian TON projects." This may be true, or it may just be based on my personal experience.

Relevant resources for building Asian projects on TON:

https://x.com/TONHackerHouse/status/1777422472046092357

https://x.com/0xHoward_Peng/status/1772895520660369883

TON Open Summit

Fundamentally, there are many more questions worth exploring, but due to the limited scope of this article, I will summarize the following key points:

• If you are a developer in Asia, you should build on TON because it is an environment you are familiar with.
• If you are stuck in a Web2 business and want to try Web3, choose TON. In fact, most successful projects come from teams with a Web2 background.
• If you are an investor who believes in Asia's potential, then you should come and build and invest.

This is why I am promoting and helping with the Open Summit held in Taipei, Taiwan, from August 6 to 8. I firmly believe that there are still many projects that have not yet gained attention, especially considering the tremendous growth of the TON ecosystem.

Source: ton.abs.io

Summit-related information: https://x.com/BuildOnTON/status/1808836768353169814

If you are a VC who has not yet explored the TON ecosystem or its projects in depth, I strongly recommend you join to discover more opportunities. From both project and VC perspectives, there is still ample room for growth and business opportunities.

Brand Building in the Mini-Program Ecosystem

With the emergence of the mini-program ecosystem, a key aspect that all TApps must focus on is brand building.

Here are some of the most successful projects in brand building on TON:

• wallet: The best centralized TON crypto wallet, also serving TON Space (non-custodial wallet);
• Crypto Bot: The best wallet bot for EVM tokens and other altcoins. Users can activate this bot service by typing @send 1 USDT in any chat;
• Whale: The largest crypto gambling bot;
• Telegram Developer Community: A dedicated place for Telegram mini-program developers to ask questions;
• Pavel Durov: Pavel Durov's Telegram username.

Source: https://x.com/0xBreadguy/status/1800908705304805659

Telegram Usernames

Due to the upcoming Telegram bot and mini-program services, the enormous demand for bot usage will directly drive the demand for these usernames, whether for purchase or sale. I believe that in the near future, Telegram usernames will be sold at increasingly higher prices on Fragment.com, indicating a growing market demand for unique and short domain names.

Telegram Stars

This is the most exciting update for me since Fragment.com. Although it seems like any payment process on other applications, I am very excited about this feature and look forward to seeing the growth in data. Relevant information is as follows:

https://t.me/BotNews/90

https://t.me/BotNews/92

Combining Telegram usernames, Telegram mini-programs, Telegram ads, and Telegram Stars, the leverage effect will be even more pronounced. In addition to providing a better Web3 entry point (this can be viewed this way), there is also the best user experience to capture the value of these digital projects and prominently display them on Telegram's pages.

• Relying on social elements, digital content (whether Jetton Tokens or NFTs) will have more opportunities for exposure;
• The shift from peer-to-peer to group interactions will generate more social content and competition based on Telegram groups, strengthening the social network;
• This will encourage users to spend more time on Telegram, building the ecosystem layer and application layer (e.g., "TApps will become the Web3 version of AppStore").

However, since the Telegram team may have some potential undisclosed information, I will not invest too much effort in this part. My main focus is on the TON blockchain and smart contracts.

The TON Ecosystem in the Second Half of 2024

There is no doubt that our goal for 2024 is to attract 10 million active on-chain users on the TON blockchain.

According to data from tonstat.com, we are already close to 5.8 million monthly active users (MAU). This is largely due to the aforementioned traffic-driven TApps, upcoming utility apps, and the influx of users looking to earn. Overall, I believe this opens up a lot of potential for expansion, accumulating first-mover advantages, and network effects.

I also believe that ultimately 80% of the traffic will be contributed by the top 20% of channels and TApps. Therefore, more projects will enter a highly competitive traffic business phase in the future. Maximizing traffic and increasing user numbers as much as possible is crucial, as this can create a leading advantage in the second phase.

What should we consider next?

As I mentioned earlier, it is crucial to guide teams to develop mini-program-based projects with investment return rates as a measure to quickly capture the market. In the near future, there will be more innovations beyond just mini-programs or current business models. For example, combining Tap-to-Earn with Launchpad models, or merging social relationships with mobile experiences in prediction markets—there are too many possibilities to explore.

Taking the success of Hamster Kombat as an example. It utilizes airdrop incentives to drive user interaction, encouraging people to click and subscribe to channels. However, I believe this is just an early example of leveraging reward attributes to change user behavior. In the future, due to its natural social viral growth, the TON ecosystem will host the most profitable projects, even surpassing FriendTech and Pump.fun. Moreover, it provides everyone with a stage to showcase and promote their NFTs and content.

The DeFi Ecosystem May Experience Explosive Growth

More projects will focus on DeFi construction, and I believe that in the second half of 2024, the DeFi sector within the TON ecosystem will make significant progress. Here are a few reasons:

• More smart contract developers are joining, and the Tact language is being strengthened and updated more frequently (https://github.com/tact-lang/tact).
• More mini-program teams are providing high-quality TApps, enabling them to explore smart contracts.
• The launch of USDT on TON has already increased the TVL on the TON blockchain, and more DApps are being developed. Additionally, more projects focused on oracle pricing are turning to TON, such as RedStone Oracles.

What are the most successful projects currently? Especially in this cycle? GMX, FriendTech, LooksRare, UniBot, and OpenSea.

I firmly believe that as more teams learn to develop mini-programs and a large influx of traffic enters TON-related applications, the DeFi protocols built on it will better align with the market and amplify network effects. For example, imagine a Polymarket mini-program built on TON and how it will easily achieve scaling and growth.

1. Traffic-driven projects will always have a greater impact, whether in dealing with exchanges or continuing to incubate new projects.

2. Investing in TON will become more complex. As more applications and mini-programs natively integrated with Telegram emerge, assessing the value of the "TON network" becomes increasingly difficult.

Conclusion

In summary, the TON ecosystem is poised for significant growth in the first half of 2024. As the Head of Developer Relations for the TON Foundation in Asia, I believe there are many areas worth focusing on: infrastructure, investor relations, payment solutions, P2P markets, DNS domains, DeFi, NFT markets, derivatives, and more. There are numerous untapped opportunities in these areas.

On the other hand, it is encouraging to see more projects from Asia joining the ecosystem. However, I must admit that the messages on Twitter and Telegram have overwhelmed me. I regret that I cannot respond to and address all projects individually. Telegram mini-programs and TON will become a way for Asian developers to make an impact and bring value to more people. This is a familiar model for those doing development work in Asia.

Personally, it is hard to describe this feeling, as we have been promoting TON for the past 1.5 years. I previously tried to build a project on TON, but progress was not smooth due to a lack of infrastructure. Compared to that time, you can clearly see that since the price increase, everyone has been talking about TON and asking questions. Now is definitely the best time to build within our ecosystem and network.

From my personal perspective, although TON is still in its early stages, it is building a strong foundation with a growing user base and functionalities such as payments and mini-programs, especially in Asia, where developer talent is abundant. This paves the way for Telegram usernames to become high-value NFTs and for TON to achieve mass adoption in the second half of 2024 through its unique DeFi and social integration potential.

I will not predict or claim to predict the price of TON; I firmly believe that attracting ten times more users is my greatest mission. I still maintain the original intention I had when I joined Binance in 2018, which was to help CZ make cryptocurrency accessible to everyone.

Changing the world is not easy; let us take responsibility together and move forward. I believe that Telegram + TON + Asia will lead us into the next bull market.