Nfts
SBINFT’s Jangdeok Ko on the Future of NFTs and Japan
SBINFT is the creator of Japan’s largest NFT marketplace, providing tools for creators and businesses to issue, sell, and manage secondary distribution of blockchain-based digital assets. Recently, we spoke with SBINFT CEO Jangdeok Ko about the NFT landscape, the future of NFTs, Japan’s role in the market, and more.
Q: What is your vision for the future of the NFT market?
A: In Japan, Web3 is attracting attention as a new frontier in the digital economic sphere and is positioning itself as a national strategy. In particular, NFTs are compatible not only with finance and art, but also with intellectual property such as anime and games, and large companies as well as venture capital firms are entering the market one after another.
However, although expectations for the growth of the industry are high, there is still no clear method of use in the business world, and the market is still in the trial and error stage for those who have entered the market.
Therefore, we want to create an environment where everyone can trade NFTs with confidence by providing a trusted platform and making NFTs a common practice in society. Our vision is to realize the statement “Be the FIRST, be the STANDARD”.
Q: How will SBINFT Market enable creators to monetize their work?
A: First, creators’ NFTs managed by “SBINFT Market” are divided into game NFTs, art NFTs and other NFTs.
Last year, SBINFT Market announced that it would be rebranding as a marketplace optimized for gaming users. However, we will continue to handle art-related and other NFTs. To make it easier for users to find the NFTs they want, we have added search elements such as genre, price, and credit card availability to the filters.
Additionally, building a fan base is important for creators to monetize their work, but community management typically requires mastery of multiple tools and is a difficult hurdle to overcome.
In addition to “SBINFT Market”, SBINFT offers the marketing team the “SBINFT Mits” platform, which is equipped with 11 functions useful for managing NFT projects and providing support for managing creators’ fan communities.
Q: How do you see the competitive landscape of the NFT market?
A: We believe that the boom in blockchain gaming and PFP, which was only transitory in its enthusiasm, has faded, and that we are finally in a phase where practical use cases for the general public are being sought.
We see examples of NFTs being used by existing businesses for new loyalty programs, ticket memberships, etc., and large game manufacturers entering the blockchain gaming space.
Competition has already begun to emerge in these areas, but the number of players is not yet large and it is difficult to predict what type of competition will emerge when large companies enter the market in the future.
In terms of market operators, even some world-renowned companies have seen their rankings change.
Besides increasing transaction volume, the key to winning the competition will be how to create a business model that does not depend solely on the volume of transactions in the market, as we do with our “SBINFT Market” as well as “SBINFT Mits”.
Q: How will SBINFT Market manage to stay ahead of the competition?
A: SBINFT’s strength lies in its exceptional visibility in the Japanese Web3 market and the reliability of the SBI Group brand.
As such, SBINFT will work with game developers to expand the market and create an ecosystem for blockchain games, with the aim of becoming a portal service for blockchain games with a large user base in the future.
In the future, we want to create a portal service for blockchain games with a large user base. In the ecosystem, we will help maximize the liquidity of gaming NFTs by using the SBINFT marketplace.
In addition, we have more partners than our competitors, and our payment methods are also very rich, such as credit card payments between users.
By providing many simple and easy-to-use features not only to users familiar with Web3 but also to users in the existing market, we will take the lead in the market and build a dominant position by actively working towards many partnerships.
Q: With the rise of play-to-earn games, what role do you see NFTs playing in the future of the gaming industry, and how is SBINFT positioned to capitalize on this trend?
A: With the creation of earn-to-earn games and NFTs, in-game items have become assets and liquidity. With the creation of assets and liquidity, we can expect an influx of not only pure gaming users, but also light gaming users looking to recoup their initial investment while having fun, as well as users whose goal is to earn money. We believe this has triggered the diversification of games, and new games such as STEPN (Move to Earn) and SNPIT (Snap to Earn) are being created.
Since SBINFT optimizes the “SBINFT Market” for gaming users’ transactions, the SBINFT Market will capture the transaction demand that arises when users are having fun and recovering their original funds.
Q: Japan has taken a proactive stance in promoting Web3. What do you think are the key factors that will determine Japan’s success in becoming a global leader in the Web3 space? How can SBINFT contribute to this goal?
A: The current trend of public-private collaboration on We3 must continue. In government, we want new technologies to continue to be supported and legislation to accompany them, as in the past, and in the private sector, we believe it is important to accumulate use cases in real business contexts while working across sectors and borders.
Additionally, SBINFT intends to support and contribute to Web2 companies entering the Web3 market through the NFT marketplace “SBINFT Market” and the marketing platform “SBINFT Mits”.
As a specific example, the “SBINFT Market” will begin operating the BONSAI NFT Club, where real bonsai trees can be obtained by increasing the number of NFTs held and prices in circulation, and through the technology cultivated in the process of operating the market, will begin issuing NFTs with preferential treatment for Securitize Japan Inc. and Rim’s Capital Co. Ltd. and RIM’s Capital Corporation.
In addition, Futabasha, a company with domestic IP content, held a campaign related to X (formerly Twitter), and while distributing NFTs to the winners, SBINFT Mits carried out anonymous delivery through SBINFT Mits.
Q: How do you see the SBINFT market evolving in the future?
A: In order to rebrand “SBINFT Market” as a marketplace optimized for game user transactions, we plan to implement features that will improve the user experience (*5).
In addition, the SBINFT marketplace will actively attract NFTs for new game titles, both domestically and internationally, and actively capture transactions in the gaming market, where the number of users and NFT transaction volume are expected to increase.
At the same time, by introducing Ponta Points, a common point service that currently has over 100 million members, as a service for domestic users, we will create opportunities for users who have no experience with Web3 or NFTs to discover NFTs and Web3 services. We plan to create a marketplace with a high level of user satisfaction.
Q: What are your long-term goals for SBINFT and how do you see the platform evolving in an ever-changing NFT landscape?
A: Our goal is to widely disseminate the different use cases of NFTs nationally and internationally.
To this end, we provide all the necessary functions and platforms for companies and project teams to use and liquidate NFTs.
Furthermore, we believe in forming an ecosystem that allows deregulation in each country, proactive use by companies and feedback to users.