Who is t3rn?

‍t3rn who? Meet the team behind the project

t3rn is a cross-chain protocol that brings fail-safe, interoperable execution and smart contract composability to the Polkadot ecosystem and beyond. But have you ever wondered who is the team building the protocol, what motivates them and what is it like to work together? We take a deep dive into what makes t3rn tick.

MEET THE T3RN FOUNDER

‍Maciej Baj, founder and CTO of t3rn, believes that to enable trust-free connection between blockchains, it is fundamental to focus on collaborating across several ecosystems, in order to bring the benefits of Web3 to the next billion users. 
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There is intense competition between blockchain solutions and not enough initiatives that merge the efforts into designing more significant systems that link them together.
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Maciej Baj has been building and developing in the blockchain ecosystem for the past six years, initially focusing on sidechain development before moving on to develop trustless cross-chain bridging solutions. 

Maciej envisioned t3rn to answer one simple question, “why can’t cross-chain executions have the same characteristics as a single ledger execution, with fail-safe execution guarantees, such as on Ethereum?”

The main characteristics of a single ledger execution on Ethereum are reversibility and composability. As an example, if we are setting up a transaction on Uniswap with a fixed slippage and the price changes by more than the set slippage, the transaction can revert and no funds will be lost.We can also compose transactions on Ethereum and revert the whole transaction when one of the atomic transactions fails. Below is an example of composable transactions on Ethereum:‍

In this example, if “supply 15 ENS” fails right from the start, the context of the composed executions will be irrational and won’t be executed and reverted, going back to its original state.

These core characteristics of composability and reversibility from single ledger executions across Ethereum are what inspired Maciej to build t3rn and bring these utilities into the cross-chain realm.
Being an open-source developer himself, Maciej has long grappled with another persisting issue in software engineering, which is how to better align the contributions and rewards for open-source developers.

Maciej Baj - Founder & CTO of t3rn

This has led to the unique ecosystem dynamics of t3rn, in which smart contract authors have the ability to be compensated for their open-source code contributions.

HOW DID T3RN START 

‍In June 2020,  t3rn received a grant from the Web3 Foundation and started the first blueprint for reversible and fail-safe smart contract execution.
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Another milestone for t3rn was joining the Substrate Builders Program, a Parity initiative that supports the most exciting projects developing in the Polkadot ecosystem. To qualify for it, it is crucial to meet stringent requirements, demonstrating a viable product built with Substrate and an accountable product roadmap. t3rn joined the program in March 2021.

During the same year in 2021, t3rn concluded a small seed sale in June 2021, led by Polychain Capital, with participation from IOSG Ventures, Digital Finance Group, and a selection of angel investors. In 2022 t3rn was part of the CoinList Seed winter batch as one of seven selected projects out of more than 1,000 that applied.

In May 2022, t3rn received a second grant from the Web3 Foundation to create XBI, an innovative XCM-based standard for smart contract communication. Since the creation of t3rn a lot has been happening and we are still in the early stages of our growth. Much more is set to come for the second half of 2022, as we continue to build and improve the t3rn protocol.

T3RN'S MISSION

Jacob Kowalewski, who leads strategy at t3rn, compares the status quo of blockchain interoperability with a very different industry: telecom network providers. “The success of mobile phones would be severely hampered if users were restricted from only communicating with those using the same network. This is not too different from the limiting and unrefined experience users and developers face in adopting blockchain technology today.”

Jacob Kowaleswski - CSO of t3rn

t3rn wants to enable trust-free collaboration between blockchains and harness this synergy by creating an ecosystem where anyone can utilize, deploy, and develop composable cross-chain smart contracts. This will benefit the blockchain developer community, creators of Dapps, as well as other blockchain projects.

In other words, t3rn aspires to create a one-stop shop for the development of the next generation of interoperable smart contracts.

WAY OF LIF3‍

Our way of lif3 consists of fundamental beliefs on how we work together as we accomplish our vision and mission.

Our Global HR Manager Lourdes Tandayag, also known as “Lulu”, believes that “having a strong and clear culture will strategically support the longevity of t3rn as a company, as it allows us to build healthier professional relationships to promote better collaboration, higher efficiency, and productivity, and most importantly, it increases the positive sentiment within the team.”

Lourdes Tandayag - Global HR Manager

Our way of lif3 allows the team to be aligned on the expectations on how we treat one another and defines what values are important to t3rn.
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She also describes our way of lif3 as the “moving force” at t3rn. It helps us determine if new hires are “fit” for the role through a more robust selection process based on skills and culture fit.

The way of lif3 is exercised through 5 principles:‍

Communication & Transparency
t3rn thrives on transparency. The more open and honest communication within the team, the better it can succeed in aligning its goals with those of other employees to create an environment that is healthy both mentally and physically for everyone involved!
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Camaraderie
When we have camaraderie in our workplace, it helps us collaborate and be more efficient. It's a great feeling when you know your team trusts each other enough to enjoy working together.

Seizing opportunities
When seizing an opportunity, the process is fast-paced and energized, gathering our focus to get a better outcome and quickly act to efficiently deliver our plan.

Results-oriented
At t3rn we always deliver to the best of our potential! 

Collaboration
Collaboration within the team and community offers a tremendous opportunity to boost knowledge. Matheus Braga De Moraes, our Community Manager, strongly believes that “we must create the discussions and questions that change the ecosystem, and these questions become even more interesting with everyone being so distributed across the world. Industries are leaning towards Asia, stocks towards the United States, but blockchain... is a nice blend of democracy.”

Matheus Moraes - Community Manager

We all have different ideas, insights, and experiences, so why not share them with the team? Join our Telegram and Discord and share your thoughts. We’d love to hear your thoughts!

‍TO BE CONTINUED

t3rn is committed to the development of a meaningful protocol for the blockchain ecosystem as a whole. t3rn is still at an early stage and we’re hiring! Check out our open positions on angel.co.

To learn more about t3rn come and join our community!

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