9th May, Chongqing-Anti-counterfeiting has always been an important use case in the application of blockchain technology. London-based startup Everledger use blockchain for diamond authentication. China-based Vechain also use blockchain for anti-counterfeiting of luxurious items and red wine. The Zhongnan Construction has united Beidahuang Group to explore blockchain’s potential in food safety. A startup team in Chongqing – Inchain, also intends to join the eco-system in the area of anti-counterfeiting. Their goal is to create a public blockchain for commercial use.

The anti-counterfeiting function offered by Inchain is fit for all types of businesses. Compared with the traditional and centralized anti-counterfeiting technology, Inchain allows merchants themselves to generate anti-counterfeiting code, removing trust issue of the intermediary party. In order to facilitate the user verification, Inchain adopts the “micro-program” of Wechat and the simplest data carrier – QR code as anti-counterfeiting label. Such implementations will help to eliminate the risk of technical hacking and data loss. The cryptology-based anti-counterfeiting source code and the portal of decentralized verification cannot be forged.

Design for commercial use

Anti-counterfeiting is the first application of Inchain, which actually position as a blockchain-based service platform. As a public chain for commercial use, Inchain has many innovations in design.

In terms of account structure, there are 3 types of accounts in the system: General account, Verified Account, Child Account of Verified Account. Verified account is merchant account and has the highest authorization to create commodities and its corresponding unique ID. The Child Account can work around the commodity with the unique ID like production, cargo delivery from warehouse and transit. Additional info could be added to track the status of commodity. At the final sale stage, General Account can verify the commodity and transfer ownership.

General flowchart of Inchain Design

It is worth mentioning that the design of the Verified Account has taken into account that the business leaders and the executors may be different. The executor maybe off site any time, therefore the account data and public key are mirrored on chain. The double private key separates the management and the business operations of the account. A shared private key controls the general info and password the account and the other private key manages the tokens transfer and the creation of merchandise and anti-counterfeiting source code and so on.

Secondly, in terms of the underlying performance, Inchain chooses to build its own blockchain in view of future traffic growth and implementation of service layer. The model of transaction and consensus mechanism could be improved and optimized in the future.

General Structure of Inchain

In terms of business model, the anti-counterfeiting feature is the first application of Inchain. However, with the research goes on, Inchain found that its bottom layer could host protocols for all sorts of scenarios. As described in the white paper, the blockchain-based logistics information management system, and the attendance office system can be realized on the existing underlying protocol.

From Biteduobao to Anti-counterfeiting

Inchain may be a young team but Yang Lin, the founder of Inchain, has been involved in bitcoin since 2010. In 2012, Yang began to study the technology of Bitcoin mining as the keyword became trendy. In 2016, he quit his job and founded his own business, the first of which is” biteduobo”, a crowdfunding project based on Bitcoin blockchain.

The founding of Inchain actually originates from a question asked by Yang. In September 2016, he asked “ Anyone is interested in founding a blockchain-based startup” in a chat group. The feedbacks were out of his expectation and finally a 9-person group was formed, from which the Inchain project was born.

Inchain Meetup

Why would Inchain choose to start from anti-counterfeiting traceability? Yang Lin believes that those who were born in the 1980s or 90s have gradually become the mainstream of society. Their perception of anti-counterfeiting will gradually increase. However, Yang Lin and the team are facing many difficulties:

“Funding comes first and the implementation is the second obstacle. But we are determined to overcome the difficulties by any means.”

Around 150 merchants joined the network

In fact Inchain has already walked through the anti-counterfeiting development. While focusing on the development of their own projects, Inchain is actively expanding the ecosystem.

Inchain told 8btc that they have now realized two projects. One is the attendance system of a research team, led by Professor Xiangyi of Chongqing Institute of Science and Technology. The second one is the healthcare project of Ou Bi Tang, which includes anti-counterfeiting traceability, physician certification, electronic medical records, data monitoring and voluntary calculation. The project aims to reshape the relationship between doctors and patients and create digital smart healthcare.

In addition, potential partners include the Arts and Crafts Association of Chongqing City, Chongqing Yipin Agriculture Co., Ltd., Hangzhou Yiqi Fashion, involving onchain proof of existence, food supply chain traceability, garments anti-counterfeiting etc. Yang Lin said that since the best test on 25th April, nearly 150 merchants have registered and around 500 users have tried out the “micro-program” on WeChat.

Meanwhile, Inchain has partnered with Chongqing Municipal Committee of Information and Technology, Chongqing Institute of Science and Technology to establish Chongqing Blockchain Alliance, hoping to further promote the development of blockchain in Chongqing.

Han Feng, General Secretary of DACA, comments:

“Block chain reverse anti-counterfeiting costs, all start-ups can circulate their royalty points, dividend ownership and product crowdfunding on blockchain. Blockchain greatly reduces the friction costs of traditional market. With the combination of QR code and Micro-programs, users can get access to the service and Inchain is expected to become the first application that reaches the general public.”

InChain is about the launch an ICO recently to raise funds for future development. In the next two month, the team will test the network thoroughly to ensure its stability and security. Yang Lin told 8btc:

“The existing version network and Wechat micro-program are pretty primitive. Continuous improvement and optimization would be made before the launch of mainnet to promote performance , user experience and more merchants participation.”

For more info about the ICO, please visit: https://ico.inchain.org/ and AMA of the team.