‍In a nutshell: DePIN is a new name for a long-time trend in Web3 — one that peaq was built for: the intersection between the connected real-world and Web3. Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks, or DePINs, crowdsource physical hardware for real-world services, from supplying energy to 5G or even mobility, using tokens as the incentive for people to participate. Such projects are Web3’s best shot at real-world adoption, and peaq’s fundamentals, tokenomics model, and core functions make it the perfect home for DePINs. The credit for the name DePIN goes to Messari. If you’re curious to learn more about DePIN in general, here’s a blog post, check it out.    

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To sustain the growing electric vehicle (EV) market, Europe would need 3.4 million public charging points by 2030, McKinsey estimated in a recent study — a tenfold increase from the status quo. In other words, while EVs grow more popular by the day, the infrastructure they need is lagging far behind. 

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Most Europeans tend to recharge their cars at home or at work, meaning there are a lot of private charging points out there, sitting idle for a solid part of the day. Making them accessible for any driver (for a fee, of course) would surely help. On top of that, it would also give charger owners an extra revenue stream, which is rarely something to complain about.

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This is a perfect DePIN case. Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks make private physical infrastructure, from chargers and solar panels to sensors and routers, a public good that anyone can access or make use of at a fee. They use blockchain and tokens to incentivize individuals and businesses to crowdfund, source, and build physical infrastructure people need and normally pay corporations for.  

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So here’s the thing: DePINin’ ain’t easy. And a lot of this has to do with how difficult it is to find a good home for such projects.

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Can’t you just Ethereum it?

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Yes, you could technically build a DePIN on any smart-contract platform. It’s kind of like with Lego, though: Yes, you build a shuttle with it and send it into space, but this apparently wasn’t good enough for SpaceX. A network tailor-made as a layer-1 for DePINs will serve them better than a general-purpose network built with little to no concern for their specific needs.  

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What are those? Well, to be able to scale fast, DePINs need:

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1) fundamentals

2) functionalities

3) tools and interfaces

4) economics

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which all work to enable smooth sailing and onboarding for new manufacturers, machines, and individuals. Unde(r)pinning all of that, DePINs require an economic system that incentivizes the community to deploy more devices, and new people — to join the network, all while remaining sustainable. 

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peaq: A layer-1 network for layer-2 DePINs

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peaq hasn’t used the term DePIN before February 2023 because DePIN wasn’t really a term before, but peaq was built from the ground up as a layer-1 platform for DePINs. peaq’s machine-focused design and tokenomics aimed at real-world value work as a power multiplier for any DePIN, which, as a concept, are fully in line with peaq’s greater vision of the Web3 Economy of Things. After all, connected infrastructure very much fits the bill for what we’ve been calling “machines” or “Things” all these years. One could argue that DePINs represent the core of the Economy of Things — the human-to-machine interactions which every other dApp in the Economy of Things leverages or facilitates. 

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Let’s dive into the core features that make peaq the perfect home for DePINs.

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Fundamentals

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Highly Secure and Decentralized
peaq is highly secure and decentralized thanks to its cutting-edge architecture which leverages the Polkadot Layer-0. Read more.

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10,000 Transactions Per Second (TPS)
The peaq network allows for high throughput thanks to asynchronous backing, capable of handling up to 10,000 transactions per second. Scalability is no issue. Read more.

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Approx $0.00025 per Transaction
Enjoy swift, dependable transactions at as little as $0.00025, enabling frictionless operations for any DePINs. 

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Most Environmentally-Friendly Web3 Ecosystem
peaq leverages the greenest blockchain technology in Web3 to ensure the Web3 Economy of Things is sustainable. Read more.

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2nd biggest Developer Ecosystem in Web3‍

peaq is built using Substrate in the Polkadot Ecosystem, which has the second-largest developer community in Web3. Read more.

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Supporting ink! & EVM Smart Contracts and Pallets
Build with flexibility and convenience, using Rust for Pallets or ink! Smart Contracts or Solidity to create EVM-compatible smart contracts. Read more.

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Ready-to-Use DePIN Backend

peaq equips DePIN builders with all the decentralized backend logic you need to build record-breakers in record time. 

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Machine IDs
Create unique self-sovereign IDs for machines, robots, and devices to enable their secure interactions within the DePIN. Read more.

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Role-Based Access Control
Efficient access management with peaq’s role-based control ensuring secure and authorized operations. Read more.

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Payment
Enable seamless, secure, and autonomous transactions between people and machines on the DePIN you’re building. Read more.

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Data Storage
Store and exchange data securely and efficiently, enabling effective communication and information flow within the DePIN. Read more.

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Data Indexing
Organize and retrieve data with the data indexing feature, enhancing usability and accessibility of information within the DePIN. Read more.

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AI-Agents
Leverage autonomous AI agents for advanced operations and interactions on the DePIN or dApp. Read more.

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Multichain Features

Interoperability is key in Web3. peaq integrates seamlessly with the two leading multi-chain networks, so when you build on peaq, you build for all of Web3.

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Polkadot
Any DePIN/dApp on peaq is natively interoperable with the Polkadot ecosystem via Cross-Consensus Message Format (XCM). Read more.

Ethereum
EVM compatibility: peaq supports EVM and thus lets you leverage all the opportunities the Ethereum ecosystem offers. Read more.

Cosmos
Exchange data and establish cross-chain identities with Fetch.ai AI agents in the Cosmos ecosystem, fostering a truly interconnected ecosystem. Read more.

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peaq’s tokenomics: Native rewards and incentivization for machines and builders alike

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A DePIN wants to incentivize new participants with token rewards. Joining in, after all, is often a risk to reward calculation: You invest in the infrastructure and its maintenance to earn on its use. A DePIN wants to make sure that the “earn” part is enough to make the “invest” part make sense. So far, so good. 

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peaq makes this equation easier to balance by adding more rewards for all machine owners who connected their devices to the network. peaq’s tokenomics model bolster’s the “earn” part by allocating a part of network revenue and block rewards to beef up the earnings of machines connected to the network. 

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A note: we use ‘machines’ as short-hand for any connected device, robot, sensor, vehicle, or machine, or in DePIN-speak, physical infrastructure.

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In other words, peaq literally adds more rewards into your rewards, as the ancient Yo Dawg memes hath foretold. This adds an extra incentive for people to connect more devices — sensors, routers, vehicles, robots etc. — into the ecosystem. On top of that, the network also channels rewards to dApps running on top of it as an extra tool supporting DePIN projects, providing them with a sustainable revenue stream.      

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Machine DeFi

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Another array of core incentive mechanisms baked into peaq fall under the umbrella term of Machine DeFi. Machine DeFi, you may have intuited, is essentially decentralized finance for machines in the Economy of Things. Machine DeFi is concerned with financing the deployment of new machines to the peaq network via crowdfunding and community-voted subsidies,  enabling increasingly autonomous machines to sustain themselves financially.

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Machine DeFi amps up the versatility of the DePIN model, allowing DePINs to scale even faster. It enables communities to leverage borderless fundraising via the blockchain to cover the upfront costs of purchasing hardware, which makes it possible for DePINs — and the people backing them — to enter markets shunned by traditional firms. 

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If you want to dive deeper into peaq’s economics, here’s a more detailed overview, and here’s a video explaining how peaq’s economic model works.  

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Interfaces & dApps

peaq control: command and control center for connected machines

With peaq control, users can connect any machine, device, vehicle, or sensor can with peaq, enabling it to join one or more DePIN networks. This creates a stacking effect, enabling DePIN builders to tap into an already existing machine pool on the network, as linking a machine with their project is as easy for the supplier as making just a few clicks. You can try the dApp here, read more about it here, and check out the documentation at this link. And if you’re more of a visual person, we’ve also made a few videos to help you get started with peaq control.

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peaq portal: economic hub for DePINs 

peaq portal is the community’s one-stop hub for managing their digital assets on peaq and take part in the various activities concerning the network's development and ecosystem growth. Its future updates will enable peaq token holders to vote on what machines should be subsidized when joining the network, helping DePINs scale up. Token holders will also be able to vote on what dApps and DePINs should get a larger share of the network revenues, amplifying their growth, and provide capital for subsidizing and deploying machines through Machine DeFi mechanisms. Read more on this here and check out the app’s current version here. 

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Have more ideas for essential functionalities and features? Please let us know! 

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krest: The world’s first and only layer-1 blockchain for DePIN testing

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You may be aware that peaq will run as a parachain on Polkadot. You may also be aware that Polkadot has a ‘live-fast, die-young’ cousin called Kusama. Kusama, Polkadot’s canary chain, enables builders and developers to test their decentralized applications on a network designed for trying (and breaking) things. The peaq community will be able to connect their devices to krest, peaq’s own canary chain on Kusama, and earn from their use and other activities on the network as developers use these devices to simulate vehicles, robots, and machines creating value within the Economy of Things. 

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The krest network enables the peaq community to develop and test DePINs, decentralized applications, and various layer-2 tools in a real environment by simulating the behavior of all kinds of machines, vehicles, robots, and devices before they go live on the peaq mainnet. 

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The krest network is live, making it the world’s first and only Economy of Things simulation network, and the world’s first and only production blockchain for DePIN testing, or ‘beta-DePINs’.

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You can read more about krest on the launch blog here, or on its webpage, here.

Join the Economy of Things

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