In blockchain years, Matej Michalko is already a veteran.

Starting out as a curious Bitcoin miner back in the day, he was one of the first to capitalize on the growing interest in cryptocurrencies as co-founder of the BitcoinExpo conferences.

ALAX is the biggest opportunity for Decent. It’s going to be our killer app. Matej Michalko Decent CEO

“I remember the first event in London in 2013 well,” he recalls.

“We had 800 people attending and the price of Bitcoin hit $1,200.”

Since those day, Michalko has had a supercharged career, setting up more blockchain events including the first in China, involvement in marketing and consulting startups, but since 2015 he’s been the founder, CEO, and president of Swiss-based tech outfit Decent.

Its mission is to “revolutionize data distribution” via its DCore open source blockchain content distribution platform.

It uses a component-based approach to enable developers to build on top of its protocol to run their own decentralized app stores.

As well as making it easier and quicker for companies to develop their own blockchain projects, Michalko points to the DCore’s underlying 5 second settlement speed and low transaction costs (0.5 US cents) as key reasons why it should be adopted.

An app Store for the masses

Yet if that was Decent’s only activity, there’d be little reason to feature it on BlockchainGamer.biz. That reason is ALAX, a blockchain-based mobile game app store for emerging markets.

A joint venture with Chinese mobile game distributor Dragonfly, which reaches 100 million users a month via its existing D-mobi app store, Michalko say ALAX is a great opportunity to highlight Decent’s approach.

“The market is 2 billion people who have low-end phones which currently don’t provide them with a good app store experience,” he explains.

“Some of them don’t even provide the option to search. I think ALAX will be a revolution.”

Dual token approach

As is often the case with blockchain businesses, the entire business loop for ALAX is fairly complex, although the app store side of it isn’t.

Effectively the new store will plug into Dragonfly’s existing model, which is working with OEMs to embed the store on their phones, something OEMs are happy to do as they can generate additional post-sale revenues.

This will provide ALAX with its scale. The store will launch for testing in late 2018, with commercial deployment planned for India, Thailand and the Philippines in Q1 2019.

In terms of its blockchain elements, the project will generate two tokens: ALX, which is an ERC-20-compliant cryptocurrency, and ALA, which is the fiat-based ‘soft’ currency for use in the app store.

Having two tokens is important as ALX operates as a standard blockchain utility token. Only 1,000 million will be created and it will trade on exchanges like any other cryptocurrency. It will also convert to ALA at a 20% discount, ensuring there’s a real-world reason to buy it.

Decent will start ALX’s token generation event on 17 April, which will see 300 million ALX sold. Michalko says he’s receiving plenty of interest in terms of private pre-sales.

ALA, however, is pegged to fiat currency and burnt after use. Unlimited amounts can be created and it will be available for users to buy through brick-and-mortar stores or from mobile operators or within the ALAX store itself.

“Of course, Decent’s technology can work for many industries. We’re talking to companies in content distribution, energy, health care, government,” Michalko says

“But we’re only 60 people. We have limited resources and I think ALAX is the biggest opportunity for Decent. It’s going to be our killer app.”

You can find out more about Decent here and ALAX here.

