Stellar Community Fund

Products & Services

With the help of SCF#11, we plan to finish our MVP that is a payment platform to facilitate instant cross-border payments for the global migration industry.

The industry is plagued by slow settlement times (2-3 days), high fees (3-10%), and often times incorrect settlement amounts due to opaque fees. Our initial target audience is legal service providers in Northern America who are representatives of current or prospective migrants in Latin America, starting with Brazil.

We chose Stellar because it solves so many persistent issues on other blockchains. For example, we are able to have near instant settlement, with very low fees, and can define settlement amounts with Path Payment Strict Receive. We also plan to use muxed accounts for a custodial style of wallet to give users a web2 feel and experience with the speed of Stellar. We are excited to integrate with US and LATAM based anchors so that users can have fluid on/off ramping in their respective countries. We’re also striving to integrate with local payment methods that allow funds received to be available for spending immediately in the desired locations of the customers.

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Previous Project(s)

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Progress so far

Goals

We have an mvp-lite version of the app running on the testnet, and with another month of development we will release a more complete version for public testing. Over the next six months we’d like to achieve the following objectives:

Complete the integrations with a US based anchor and nTokens, the Brazilian anchor, to set up the US <> Brazil payment corridor. We have the infrastructure mostly setup for SEP-24 to start, (would like to use SEP-6/12 in the future), and have been successful in a testing environment, we are formalizing the agreements and will refine the code and UI, then squash any bugs. (November)
Reconstruct the backend of the application. We are currently using Moralis’ hosted MongoDB database and cloud functions for our backend, it offered a quick way to prototype and test, but is not suitable for long term use. We’d like to set up an express backend with an AWS RDS. This will be essential to our initial MVP release so that we have a scalable solution we can quickly iterate and improve upon. (November)
Once the backend is complete, integrate a custodial wallet using muxed accounts. (December)
We’re incorporated as a Delaware C-corp, and now need to attain legal counsel. (December)
Refresh our UI/UX, landing page, and marketing materials with design support. (December)
We’re participating in two well-known online startup incubators and would like to go towards a pre-seed round. (January)
Begin marketing and attending conferences once the mvp is launched. (starting in January)
We’re inspired by the new Anchor Platform, and would like to explore this opportunity. (January)
We’ve signed an NDA with Mastercard and will explore their products to see how EmigroPay could benefit from them. (January)
To service customers in Canada and Mexico we would integrate with anchors in both. (February)
To be able to offer additional services for our clients in the US we’d like to initiate the process of becoming a neobank. (February)
We would like to increase the liquidity pool for BRL / USDC to be able to offer a stable exchange rate as close to mid-market as possible. (March)
By Q2 2023 we want to ensure we’re meeting the financial regulatory requirements of the markets we’re operating in. (April)

To get there, we request a budget of

50,000

to:

funds to cover initial legal costs
a part-time full-stack dev to work with Nathan
a freelance designer to complete our branding and web design (or design subscription service)
funds for the initial marketing campaign
consideration for additional funds for BRL / USDC liquidity

Additional information

EmigroPay is the digital currency payments & remittance solution that global citizens from around the world will use to transfer money across borders.

Transferring money across borders has high costs, delays, and other problems between migrants and their legal service providers, or friends and family that they support.

Costly and slow bank wire transfers (Unable to know transfer fees and timing)
Customers lacking an international credit card (Unable to use business services such as Stripe)
Predatory money transfer services (High fees, and can be dangerous at physical shops)

Digital currencies, specifically stablecoins, offer a cheaper and faster solution than traditional cross-border fiat transfers. A managed payments & remittance service can make the confusing web3 experience accessible to migrants, and those that they send money to.

USDC stablecoin for reliability & global reach (Also as an inflation hedge, as currency devaluation in developing countries far exceeds that of the US)
Digital currency for borderless transactions (Low fee, instantaneous payments and remittances from device-to-device)
Simplified web3 experience (Abstract away the main web3 UX problems)

Remittances sent to people abroad, or money sent back home is the biggest opportunity, however, offering the EmigroPay product as payments for legal services is a much earlier time to capture long-term migration customers, while also capturing the business customers that are serving them.

Pitch deck

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Deliverables

First Deliverable

Links:

Demo of Testnet Product

Login: serviceProvider@gmail.com
Password: Password
https://uat.emigropay.com/login

Team

NF285#2973

Co-Founder & CTO

I have a background in financial markets and had always wanted to learn to code, took my chance a few years back to learn with the goal of creating a product that can have a positive impact on others. After working as a dev at a fintech company and many other side projects, I’m excited to be a part of Emigro fulfilling that goal.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nathan-frank-8a743568/

Blake_Emigro#0019

Founder & CEO

A multi-career technology & legal project generalist.

mechanical engineering technologist and project manager with 15 years of employment (machine & process design for mass manufacturing / industrial automation)
Canadian immigration consultant with 4 years of experience (skilled worker clients mostly from Latin America, primarily from Brazil)
tech founder and product manager with 6 years of experience (launched one product, and built two demos)
building EmigroPay on Stellar

https://www.linkedin.com/in/blake-sieders/

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The USD valuation of the budget request in XLM will be calculated using the CF Stellar Lumens-Dollar Settlement Price on December 5, 2022 as administered, maintained, and reported by the cryptocurrency index provider CF Benchmarks Ltd. (using the ticker “XLMUSD_RR”) (available at https://www.cfbenchmarks.com/indices/XLMUSD_RR). Learn more in the SCF Handbook.

*The USD valuation of the award in XLM is calculated using the CF Stellar Lumens-Dollar Settlement Price on July 5th as administered, maintained, and reported by the cryptocurrency index provider CF Benchmarks Ltd. (using the ticker “XLMUSD_RR”) (available at https://www.cfbenchmarks.com/indices/XLMUSD_RR)

**The USD valuation of the award in XLM is calculated using the CF Stellar Lumens-Dollar Settlement Price on December 16, 2021 as administered, maintained, and reported by the cryptocurrency index provider CF Benchmarks Ltd. (using the ticker “XLMUSD_RR”) (available at https://www.cfbenchmarks.com/indices/XLMUSD_RR)

*The USD valuation of the award in XLM is calculated using the CF Stellar Lumens-Dollar Settlement Price on September 27, 2021 as administered, maintained, and reported by the cryptocurrency index provider CF Benchmarks Ltd. (using the ticker “XLMUSD_RR”) (available at https://www.cfbenchmarks.com/indices/XLMUSD_RR)

* The USD valuation of the award in XLM is calculated using the CF Stellar Lumens-Dollar Settlement Price on the date of transfer as administered, maintained, and reported by the cryptocurrency index provider CF Benchmarks Ltd. (using the ticker “XLMUSD_RR”) (available at https://www.cfbenchmarks.com/indices/XLMUSD_RR)

*This budget request has not been fully awarded to the project. The USD valuation of the budget request in XLM will be calculated using the CF Stellar Lumens-Dollar Settlement Price on day of payment as administered, maintained, and reported by the cryptocurrency index provider CF Benchmarks Ltd. (using the ticker “XLMUSD_RR”) (available at https://www.cfbenchmarks.com/indices/XLMUSD_RR). Learn more in the SCF Handbook.