"Silent" Wave: Exploring the Low-Key Journey of BNBChain

Author: OdailyNews

In November, Bangkok, the humid air is filled with intense anticipation. The bustling crowd at the Devcon venue reflects the frenzy of BTC's price breaking through $90,000, while rumors about memecoins reaching a million circulate on social media.

Traffic here is stagnant, with ride-hailing apps displaying a vascular red; red also appears under the nearby overpass, where local children shake red transparent plastic cups towards passersby, mostly empty. On the other side of the night, the same red appears in the eyes of the hackathon developers: the high-pressure development in a short time leaves them exhausted yet excited.

At the BNBChain Bangkok hackathon venue, the air conditioning is ample, and the space is generous. The snack area quickly runs out of a certain flavor of Tom Yum chips, and Coca-Cola is the most popular drink. Within 24 hours, over 100 developers submitted 38 projects, with 8 teams getting the chance to showcase, half of which are from India, and 3 teams received prizes to enter the next phase. Teams whisper in the audience, some shake hands and say they will come again next time. The low-key and quiet competition feels like a small tide, as if gathering strength.

In the past three years, BNBChain has hosted over 20 hackathons, covering tens of thousands of developers from more than 35 countries, with over 1,000 projects submitted and a total prize pool of about $50 million.

"The Silent Three Years"

There was once a voice in the community saying, "Nobody is playing with BNBChain anymore." It wasn't until recently that the launch of BSC-based Thena (THE) and various memecoins on Binance sparked some attention.

During the "silent" period of the past three years, BNBChain appeared calm on the surface, but the data revealed another dimension.

According to DeFilama data from November 2024, BNBChain remains firmly in the second tier behind Ethereum. Currently, it ranks third in stablecoin market capitalization, with a TVL (Total Value Locked) of over $8 billion, placing it fourth, and its weekly trading volume accounts for one-sixth of the entire on-chain world.

BNBChain currently offers 218 developer tools, with over 800 active applications, excelling in DeFi, gaming, and AI sectors.

Launched in 2021, the MVB (Most Valuable Builder) program is a crucial part of BNBChain's support for early projects. According to publicly disclosed information, out of the 131 projects incubated in the past seven MVB sessions, 75 projects have attracted attention from leading investment institutions including Binance Labs, Coinbase Ventures, Delphi Capital, and ZhenFund, with Binance Labs investing in 39 of these projects. According to incomplete statistics, over 60 projects have completed their TGE, with more than 60% listed on top centralized exchanges, including Galaxy, Mobox, SpaceID, SleeplessAI, and Altlayer, which launched on Binance LaunchPool.

Given the high elimination rate characteristic of the Web3 industry, the survival rate of these early projects supported by BNBChain is remarkable. However, this data is often not perceived by the outside world.

While users have recently embraced the meme culture wave on Solana, the BNBChain community, like many other public chains, looks on with envy at this explosive user growth and attention.

From an objective data perspective, there is still a significant difference in the number of memecoins launched on BNBChain compared to Solana. Currently, there are long-lived meme projects like 1 MBABYDOGE, SimonCat (CAT), WHY, and CHEEMS that have launched on Binance contracts or spot markets. With the completion of infrastructure like launch platforms such as Four.meme and long-term community support, we can expect to see a more vibrant "Meme Season" on BNB Chain.

"Turning Towards the Sea"

If Ethereum is like a group of idealistic geniuses, and Solana is a pioneer adept at capturing attention, then BNBChain resembles a silent craftsman diligently toiling away.

The important role that Binance plays in this ecosystem is undeniable. However, the BNBChain community lacks star figures and dazzling technical geniuses; instead, it consists of a group of individuals with smaller egos, focused and pragmatic. Their frequent contemplation is: Should we follow the short-term tide? What are the truly valuable things in the long term?

Meme represents public sentiment, carries the emotions of the community, and is also the direction supported by BNB Chain, but the industry cannot be solely about memes. Through countless discussions within the community and teams, BNBChain has gradually formed a clear positioning: Web3 needs to move towards broader and more practically meaningful application scenarios.

From both temporal and spatial dimensions, BNBChain has patiently laid out a comprehensive support system for developers and users.

In terms of time, it started by hosting hackathons to discover and support potential developers and projects; the BIA (Incubation Alliance) supports projects in capital connections, and then through MVB, it conducts weeks-long incubation academy projects to provide resource investment. In the mid-term, it incentivizes user activity (DAU), total locked value (TVL), and trading volume after project deployment, while also providing technical and market support. In the later stage, it connects resources across the entire ecosystem, including but not limited to investment and listing resources, as well as the subsequent development of projects.

This timeline advancement model often begins with a 1-2 year accompaniment.

In terms of spatial horizontal dimensions, the multi-chain ecosystem centered around BNB includes: the smart chain BSC, the high-performance layer two opBNB, and the storage chain Greenfield, providing developers and users with a complete "oneBNB" multi-dimensional infrastructure system.

The sea is right there. The ship has been built, but where are the caravans and the flow of people going?

"The Direction of the Tide: AI+"

In the ebb and flow of cryptocurrency, building a solid ecosystem in its own way.

According to DappBay, in the past 30 days, 5 out of the top 10 projects by active addresses on BNB Chain are AI-related infrastructures and tools, and 3 are in Gaming.

Currently, there are over 30 active projects related to the AI ecosystem deployed on BNBChain, such as AI Agent types: My Shell, HoloWorld AI, Sleepless AI; content creation applications like NFPromt; middleware REVOX, Aggregata. Due to the support of the Greenfield storage chain, the proportion of data-related projects is high, such as data labeling (Data Labelling) projects like DIN, Alaya AI, JoloWorld, etc. According to DappRadar data from November 20, DIN ranks first among all AI applications with nearly 700,000 weekly active addresses.

This trend is not hard to understand. BNBChain has its own layer two high-speed opBNB and data storage chain Greenfield infrastructure, providing an efficient, secure, and private data storage platform, which is the underlying core for deploying decentralized AI applications.

The BNB community's supportive attitude towards AI can be described as "clear-cut"; most of the projects mentioned above were incubated through MVB, with Binance Labs investing in 7 of them. Support began even earlier than MVB and investment stages—such as StoryChain, a project that emerged from last year's BNBChain hackathon, which made it into the MVB eighth phase selection list, with its mainnet set to launch next year.

The initial intention behind laying out the storage chain may stem from optimism about decentralized social (DeSoc). Interestingly, the infrastructure of BNB Chain's data storage chain combined with the NFTization of intellectual property, along with the vigorous development of the AI+Data ecosystem, perfectly aligns BNBChain with the recently rising wave of decentralized science (DeSci).

DeSci typically requires strong data storage capabilities and rapid access support, and this data is often sensitive and private. The existing ecosystem of BNBChain can help researchers share data more safely and effectively, provide lower-cost data computing resources, and ensure fair distribution of scientific results through smart contracts.

This positions BNB Chain as a potential nurturing ground for the DeSci wave, aiding in more transformative scientific progress for humanity.

"Pragmatic and Diverse Ocean Vision"

In addition to the strong data-related AI field, the BNBChain ecosystem is currently also making strides in DeFi, GameFi, and stablecoin payment sectors.

In the BTCFi sector, projects like Solv Protocol, Avalon Labs, Lorenzo, Lombard, and Kinza rank at the forefront in terms of TVL. Among them, Solv, Lorenzo (formerly MEP), and Kinza are projects incubated through the MVB program and have received investment from Binance Labs. Avalon, a new member of MVB's eighth phase, saw its TVL grow by over 300% after joining the BIA (Incubation Alliance), according to Messari's Q3 report.

Gaming has always been the stronghold of BNBChain; during the last GameFi summer, over 40% of gaming projects were built on BSC, gathering a large number of game users and developers. Currently, the most active projects in terms of user numbers and transactions include: Seraph, TG mini-game World of Dypians, Egg Drops, as well as Gomble Games (which has received investment from Binance Labs) and Elfin Metaverse. Their weekly active users range from 600,000 to 1 million, contributing to most of the transaction volume on BNBChain.

Many projects currently emerging on BNBChain are still quite young, but if we trace back to the incubation history of BNBChain and Binance Labs, we can find coincidences that do not seem to belong to the same period.

For example, the leading project in the RWA sector, Ondo, was incubated in the third phase of MVB; at the same time, there were: DeFi protocol Impossible Finance; DeFi data tools and wallet Debank; trading platform Woo Network. Recently, the BTCFi protocol Solv Protocol, which has gained significant attention due to a substantial increase in TVL, is one of the outstanding graduates of the fourth phase of MVB. Also in the fourth phase are: security network Goplus Security and the once-hot GameFi star StarSharks.

Although these projects belong to different fields and fluctuate due to narrative changes, they have all survived in this fast-paced and brutal industry over time. Their commonality lies in providing application value to users in their respective fields, and these grown projects have injected more diversified possibilities into the BNBChain ecosystem and the entire cryptocurrency industry.

Hot topics in the industry are always emerging and switching rapidly. What BNBChain has been doing for a long time can actually be summed up in one sentence—simply building infrastructure, attracting more developers and applications, and creating value for users.

All along, BNBChain has stated that its vision is to attract the next billion users into Web3—this statement sounds a bit distant and abstract. However, it seems that this community is proving its development philosophy and aesthetics through actions: pragmatic, long-term, and value-creating.

Through continuous improvement of infrastructure, the rise of AI, and exploration in Gaming and DeFi, what BNBChain has always envisioned and is now depicting is a more comprehensive and long-lasting Web3 ocean.