TON's current location attracts attention - "TON New Year Party" event report

On January 20th, a network event was held for TON (The Open Network), which has attracted attention in the Web 3.0 field and is one of the most representative projects of 2024.

TON is a blockchain project launched by the Durov brothers, founders of Telegram, a global messenger app used by approximately 1 billion people worldwide. It is currently developed and operated by the non-profit organization TON Foundation.

TON's popularity has increased significantly since the release of the blockchain game "Hamster Kombat" that can be played on Telegram last year. Since then, mini-app development on Telegram has been active.

As dApps and products using TON are expected to increase further in 2025, TON Japan, a Japanese accelerator related to TON and TMA (Telegram Mini Apps), held an event. Iolite also participated in the event, which discussed the current status of TON and future initiatives.

Speakers at the event included Aru Sasaki, CEO of TON Japan, Lucy, Partnership Lead of TON Society, and other members of the TON community, as well as Tsuneki Hosogane, CEO of 0x Consulting Group.

Mr. Sasaki of TON Japan introduced the current status of TON and projects that are currently producing results. He emphasized that the Apps Network, a unique user mutual customer referral program service, is doing well.

He then stated that TON Japan is supporting businesses that want to expand services that utilize TON from overseas to Japan and from Japan to overseas, and that the number of partner companies is increasing.

▶︎Mr. Sasaki, TON Japan

Next, Lucy of TON Society spoke mainly about community activities, including the countries in which the community currently exists.

TON Society is an organization that supports the TON blockchain community, and its mission is to connect members and raise awareness about TON. It is currently active in nine global event hubs in Asia and Europe, and more than 50 TON channels, and hosts TON's largest community event, The Gateway.

Lucy also introduced events such as "Hackers League 24 summer," in which he reported that 2,000 applications were built on TON during the event.

▶Lucy, TON Society

In the middle of the event, it was announced that TON Japan and 0x Consulting Group had signed a comprehensive partnership. 0x Consulting Group provides consulting services for Web 3.0 businesses, and offers a wide range of services, including building new business models using NFT/FT, marketing strategy planning, community design and management, and data analysis.

▶ From the left: Mr. Sasaki, TON Japan; Mr. Hosogane, 0x Consulting Group

The main goal of this partnership is to popularize games built on TON, and TON Japan explained that it will accelerate the services it provides and TON awareness activities. Hosogane of 0x Consulting Group said that he will be responsible for strengthening TON's marketing in Japan, and that they will leverage the strengths of both companies to widely popularize Japanese games both domestically and internationally.

At the end of the event, a panel discussion was held. In addition to Sasaki and Lucy, four speakers, including Ryo Sakai from Coinpost and Miki Kawaguchi from 0x Consulting Group, took the stage.

In this discussion, they looked back on the reasons why the industry was so popular in 2024 from their own perspectives, and talked about future developments after 2025.

In particular, it was impressive that they mentioned improving Telegram's image as a challenge in deploying TON in Japan. Telegram has been used for crimes due to its high anonymity, and the current situation is that it has a bad image in Japan. In addition, they cited the small number of Japanese users who utilize TON as one of the challenges.

On the other hand, as a business benefit, some voices were raised that in 2025, it will be easier to monetize by taking into account the user base, and it will be possible to involve more users. In addition, since TON is deploying DeFi like a kind of game, it is expected to continue to expand in scale, and there were positive opinions that this wave may reach Japan in 2025.

I feel that the event was an opportunity to learn a wide range of information, including not only TON's current status, but also the challenges it faces and its development in Japan. It was also impressive to see how attentive the participants were in listening to each speaker, which shows how much attention TON is attracting.

▶ Networking session

Currently, the cryptocurrency market is performing well due to expectations for Trump, who has just been inaugurated as the US president. However, once prices have settled down, interest in the public is expected to decline, and we can expect an increase in project withdrawals. However, if a project is based on real demand, users will continue to utilize it, and its scale will steadily expand, even if the market enters a period of decline.

In that sense, TON's future developments are likely to continue to attract attention.

Image: Iolite and TON Japan