China’s largest portal operator Baidu released a beta version of its “Superchain“. It is a blockchain-based open network service that allows small and medium-sized businesses and developers to develop their projects.
Superchain is a blockchain network that Baidu has developed. The network allows small and medium-sized companies to build their dApps without technical barriers at a low cost. This is in line with the Chinese authorities’ move to apply the blockchain at a national level.
Baidu made the announcement during an online press conference. The company announced on its official website that users who want to build the dApps by March will only have to pay 1 yuan ($0.14) for it.
Superchain networks operate as a series of master nodes and use parallel chain technology to simplify processing of smart contracts, according to the white paper. Among the master nodes are Tsinghua University and Aichii, a large Chinese streaming service company.
Superchain has about 3.5 million users and has so far generated 450 million transactions, according to its official website.
This beta service is not the first service Baidu has created for blockchain developers. Baidu had already developed a Baidu blockchain engine in February last year to address the computing issues and storage problems that developers face when building applications. It also released its BaaS platform in January 2018.
Apart from Baidu Superchain, other China’s Internet giants are also launching blockchain networks
Not only Baidu, but many Internet giants in China are stepping up their blockchain initiatives.
Alibaba’s Ant Financial will announce its own Consciousness Blockchain network around February. Ant Financial is also the company that manages Alipay in China. It has also been investing on South East Asia decacorn company, Grab and making financial breakthroughs in the region.
Tencent and JD Chain also came up with a proposal white paper for their own blockchain platform as a service.
