NEM Foundation - Funding Proposal 2019

Project Proposals
#100

Thanks @missflora, appreciate all you do with the community in Taiwan as well!

#101

Well. Any suggestion to get the price up? Or just coming for trolling with no value proposition or useful feedback?

5 Likes
#102

After reading some comments here and in telegram I want to clarify some things:

  1. Is not true that NF representatives wasted time and money doing Marketing and youtube videos. There was only 2 people doing videos for NF, Alexandra for Inside NEM and Alexis Trujillo for Latinem.
    I have to say the NEM Latam videos (academia) and Inside Nem videos (Alex) are awesome and useful. Super professional, much better that other companies with nothing.

  2. We have to separate XEM from NEM. XEM price was down because the Coincheck hack, probably the Petro, and because the whole market was bearish. Period. Without those things, XEM probably wouls stay in the top ten and better price.

  3. One of the main problems during last year was that after Lon left, Kristof could not act as the a president. He has no power and the council were blocked with 2 different visions. (Stephen Chia strategy and Kristof (europe) one). Because of that there was no global strategy and no leadership.

  4. Another problem was the communication. Internal was a mess and outside I think we could do better with PR and global events. Consensus was not positive. ( I did not assist, I was In South Korea in another conference doing my job). But after having the biggest pavillon the outcome was very little.

  5. We failed attending some conferences and not attending another ones.

  6. Everybody was working and doing partnerships and MOU but then there was not a product manager, a CTO or a manager to track this projects. There was not enought trainners and devs to help. The technical info was not good. The myth that NEM is super easy and Ethereum/solidity was difficult did not help. Eth dev community is higher than NEM. Period. I talked with many devs and were lost and disappointing with the NEM website and the tech documentation.

  7. We had so many employees. Some regions has too much people, other too little but in general the outcome was not the best.
    So IMO is not the marketing the issue. NO LEADERSHIP, NO GLOBAL STRATEGY, NO CONTROL, NO COMMUNICATION.

Saying that I have to admit that I made mistakes and things wrong. Everyday trying to learn and be a better person. I wish that some people in Foundation were more humble and has less ego.

Anyway Luckily now we have Alex and new council that are working hard to release this proposal. I’m happy that the community is involve on this, giving feedback and ideas. As I said, NF is the representation of the community. Together we can put NEM in the top.
If NF is no longer exist I have to say that I don’t think NEM Ventures , core devs or even the new nem LAbs can commercialize NEM and Catapult by themselves and therefore help the XEM price.
I will vote YES.
Soon I will share my thoughts about new proposal.

1 Like
#103

Monthly payroll is too high even in the 2019 plan.

According to the foundation 's Bounty system, the evaluation of Japanese articles I have published was $ 5 per article.

5 Likes
#104

Hi @Kimble_Ngo, thanks for your feedback, just responding to some of your comments:

Yes, we have discussed with the council about all options and treasury management will be key in making sure that should the funding be approved, we managed the XEM transparently and all FIAT amount is used as needed especially during this market conditions. It will be an ongoing process.

There will be many factors - cost-effectiveness, hiring based on merit, looking at diversity in locations etc.

As for the Singapore legal retainer, that has been look at a few options already and the cost and standards in the industry have been relatively high.

Hence, the need to develop specific Chief Revenue Officer role rather than combining roles with BD, marketing etc. there should be a strong focus on revenue generation indeed.

1 Like
#105

First of all, Thank you for Exco & Councilors, detailed materials.
I can see that a huge amount of time was spent just by looking at the first glance.

Please let me ask you 4 questions.

  1. Is it possible to tell us more details? 2018 and 2019.(Proposal deck 43 page “Why Is Our Budget Better?”)
    · Number of people
    · Their position
    · Number of people by position
    · Pay by position
    I do not know about other countries, But NEM Japan seems to be an unusually high salary despite having little success. (2018) This is flaming on Twitter now.

  2. Do you have a personnel evaluation system for Exco & Councilors? If not, how do you control motivation to achievement?

  3. Does the Exco & Councilors concurrently take on the CXX? I am concerned that the person concurrently serving as a CXX with a Exco & Councilors trying to obtain funds illegally .( I know that you are about to create a new process. )

  4. Is it possible for the community to hear the opinion of this proposal from core-devs?

4 Likes
#106

Hi ExCo and Council and the community.

I want to start out with a big thank you as looking at this, and the process that went into it, this really is a phenomenal amount of work in such a short amount of time. Just the video alone took a lot of editing and time (over 20,000 words because I transcribed it).
I feel it may be a bit unfair for me to comment objectively on the proposal as a ‘former’ NF team member, of course the staff are uneasy and concerned for their futures.
Do I think this is the correct way forward? Yes. Focusing on Catapult and putting out the products the market wants, the community wants is the way to go. Even if it means the end of my journey with the Foundation, this is the right decision, and I support this 100%.
For some other critiques from community members about months funding set against milestones I really think that won’t work as top talent is not going to work on a monthly contract basis, that’s not the way to recruit nor retain the people you need to get the products out in an efficient and cost-effective manner.

  • I would be interested to know which of the verticals you will get up and running first and which you will be bringing online later, and is there an approximate timeline for that?

  • I would also like to know, if a community member came to you with a product already finished, would you accept it, (no payment required).

  • With the BRI partnership, what is the most optimal way to leverage that for future revenue generation or market analysis?

Really, best of luck moving forward, I will be voting yes on the proposal, and I will encourage all of our Thailand community members to read the proposal carefully and vote accordingly.

Thanks again for all the work.
L

3 Likes
#107

I love the details and transparency. A big thank you for everyone involved.

I see a focus to deliver catapult and associated technicals which I think is great.

I’m interested to know more details for the business development and marketing areas. As stated, to see more enterprise adoption and more blockchain transactions, what are the plans for accomplishing these two from a business development and marketing mindset.

  • What are the barriers here?
  • What are the biggest challenges? NEM not being known well enough, missed opportunities, ineffective direction or goals, missing technicals or something else?
  • Accomplishments from 2018?
  • Expectations for 2019?

For the teams that already exist, when can we see their KPI’s/goals? For the mentioned key objectives under each team, can we get future updates? Quarterly may not make sense but perhaps semiannually? Some of the objectives may not make sense to make public but I’m thinking at least business development and marketing.

The proposal is encouraging. The transparency is huge, continuing this will encourage more interest in NEM.

#108

Thanks @Trikar_Blockchain for your vote of confidence in the new NF structure, it is a team effort in getting everyone around NEM and Catapult and I do believe that the refreshed structure will help with the XEM price too.

Which is what the council has been doing and will be conscious off, no lone wolf or one man show but working together as team.

Thanks @r3n3, we need to consistently work with partners to ensure we grow together. Appreciate the constructive input from the community.

And that is why we are product-focus on Catapult and revenue-driven to be sustainable. Thanks @eddy

#109

Just a gentle reminder that we are given the first 5 days for us to give our feedback in order to have them considered/reflected in the changes. 4 days left… :slight_smile:

Just a little concerned as there seems to still be an emphasis on the past and the legacy/problems it came with in the chats - the very same legacy the NEW council had to deal with and the very same problems they are now seeking to address in this new proposal. All in the span of one month while managing the transition from what we know to be messy. It is apparent much lessons were learnt from the past and translated into this new structure and direction moving forward.

Yes, there are questions that should be and could be answered better. There are also many that have already been answered a number of times and articulately - in this very proposal even. Regarding unanswered questions directed towards this proposal, hopefully they can be addressed in timely manner.

Please note that this is not to call anyone out but simply to shift once again the focus toward the fact that the new Exco and council is now bringing a lot more opportunity for involvement and input from the community to the table. So let’s take them up on their offer and start giving constructive feedback to make the proposal even more solid for the benefit of everyone and let’s all look more towards growing together in the future.

Good job in creating more transparency and shift of focus towards Catapult and sustainability from the council.

1 Like
Another President steps down - Is History Repeating?
#110

How many staff are there in each country?
Please clarify.

I am Japanese, but I do not know how many staff there are in the Japanese team.
I want to know the numbers before and after layoff.

3 Likes
#111

I can only tell you how many there were in my country. Two. Myself and the Thai staff mandated by Thai law.
I’m sorry I cannot answer your other question.
Laura

1 Like
#112

I think most of the engineers of the Foundation who contributed to Catapult are NEM EU.
I think that the engineers of NEM EU will transfer to NEM Lab.

Then, I have some questions.

  1. Are there any engineers other than NEM EU(NEM Lab)?
  2. What kind of relationship will the NEM Foundation build with NEM Lab?
9 Likes
#113

After reading through topic I probably will vote yes for both parties (NEM Foundation and NEM lab). Allthough I would like to hear more about how they will manage to sell XEM’s for needed USD. Will it be done on monthly basis or pay salaries with NEM etc.

1 Like
#114

…also would it be OTC trades when they convert XEM to fiat, so that it doesn’t affect the market price?

#115

  1. If the price of XEM goes down, we will strategically reduce staff and projects. We aren’t hiring at full capacity in the beginning. We would be ramping up specifically for positions we need to focus on that are technical and projects that focus on bringing in revenue.

  2. If the price of XEM goes up, we will slowly put fiat into the banks to help sustain us long term. If it rises for an extended time; we would also look at which projects were most successful and create more of those. A XEM surge does not mean salaries go up—they won’t. It means we look at the ROI of programs and pivot to add new resources to support positive results.

We will take care to avoid hurting the XEM price through rapid selling. Salaries will be a mix of fiat and XEM. We will liquidate as necessary, with priority for the first 3 months. After that we will make responsible decisions based on financial analysis.

^ just pasting this here from the Foundation Proposal deck so people can see this clearly since this seems to be a point of major contention.

1 Like
#116

Okay, thanks for clarifcation. It does sounds reasonable and sustainable enough at the moment.

PS. What about that legendary silver coin fund? Have anyone planned to do something with it?

#117

I think the NEM Community should take a lot of positives from the proposal above. I hope people take the time to listen to the full presentation from Alex and absorb everything that is being planned here. For me, the key aspects that make this a good proposal are:

  • A strong commitment to good governance, well thought-out structures, and accountability.
  • Building for the future. A product focus is right for NEM (and Blockchain more generally), and is well overdue. BUIDL! That’s how you’re going to get the market up, but more importantly it’s what we’re all here for.
  • Significantly improved communication with the NEM Community, building trust and demonstrating accountability

Any concerns I have are really more to do with sanity-checking the feasibility of turning things around with what is being requested here.

  • A 69% cut in staff is a high number. Going from a $22M budget to $8M is a big drop. With such a short time frame to freeze the team, and so many leaving, there is a danger that a lot of corporate knowledge is gone for good.
  • This has been partly addressed above by Alex but the target salaries for some roles (particularly dev roles) seem under-budgeted, and I’m mindful that the best dev shops I’ve ever seen hire a smaller number of people who are extremely good at what they do (and don’t come cheap).
  • The request is for 1 year’s funding, and XEM may yet drop further. What happens then? The projected revenue presumably doesn’t cover the full budget, so how do the activities get funded beyond 2019?

So in summary, YES I think the proposal needs to be supported, and I may be going against the grain here, but if anything I worry that it’s too ambitious to do everything proposed here with significantly reduced budget and a year to turn things around.

2 Likes
#118

Hi God Tanu,
I only know 2 people in Nem Japan. Ninja and Rio. If there are more people they should answer to you.
I met many Nem representatives in different countries but not everyone know each others or knew how many people are in a team.
BTW, I was alone in Hong Kong.

Anyway, I hope you support the New NF and honestly I know Japanese community is very active and not everybody is happy with NF but you should ask what do you want or expect from NF in Japan (apart from Catapult :slight_smile:) so Nem representatives can do better and support.
Thanks

1 Like
#119

I think it should be used to compensate the stakeholders who’ve HODLed through the ATH and lows and remained loyal, and have been shafted by the 2018 foundation. Just saying… :wink:

1 Like