Host: @OdailyChina
Guest Speaker: Theseus, CEO & Co-founder of THENA
Time: December 3, UTC+8 7:00 PM / UTC+2 1:00 PM
Topic: Fireside Chat with THENA CEO: Building the DeFi SuperApp for Mass Adoption
As THENA becomes a partner project for the second phase of the Binance HODLer airdrop and launches spot and perpetual contracts for $THE, THENA is steadily moving towards its goal of becoming a "DeFi SuperApp." Odaily Planet Daily invites and interviews THENA's CEO Theseus (Adriano) to gain insights into his vision of bridging the gap between DeFi and traditional finance. THENA aims to make blockchain financial solutions more accessible to a wider audience, paving the way for the mass adoption of DeFi. In this interview, we will explore how THENA expands the DeFi ecosystem, addresses key industry challenges, and drives initiatives for the future development of DeFi.
Odaily Planet Daily: Alright, let's start with the first question. The $THE token performed exceptionally well after its listing on Binance last week. Has there been any change in the team's daily operations? How do you feel about the current situation?
Theseus: I'm very happy to participate in this interview today, and I appreciate the invitation and support from Planet Daily! The listing on Binance feels incredibly exciting! After three years of building during a bear market, successfully landing on the world's largest exchange is not only significant but also deeply satisfying for us. This is an important milestone for THENA.
Speaking of changes, this feels more like a new beginning for us. Since the Binance listing, THENA has received increasing attention. We are now receiving many collaboration requests, with numerous protocols eager to partner with THENA. At the same time, platform traffic has surged, prompting us to upgrade our backend infrastructure to ensure scalability and stability.
That said, there hasn't been much change in how the team operates. We remain focused on optimizing the platform, launching new features, deepening partnerships, and exploring the best strategies to drive ecosystem development. So even though these past two weeks have been busier than usual and traffic has increased significantly, it still feels like part of our daily work.
We are proud of the achievements we've made so far. For some investors and long-term supporters, the listing of $THE on Binance has been a long-awaited goal, and it can even be seen as an ultimate milestone. But for us, this is both a phase of achievement and a brand new starting point.
Moving forward, our top priority is to maximize the exposure and resources brought by this opportunity, continue to develop THENA, and ultimately achieve our goal of making it the most successful decentralized exchange in the DeFi space.
Odaily Planet Daily: Can you tell us more about THENA and your background in the cryptocurrency field?
Theseus: Of course! First, let me briefly introduce the development of THENA. I know many people have only recently become aware of THENA, but in fact, we have been building for two years. THENA officially launched in early January 2023. Since then, we have rapidly grown to become one of the largest DEXs on the BNB Chain and have started to stand out, even becoming one of the more influential platforms in the entire cryptocurrency space.
Currently, THENA is a comprehensive trading platform that combines usability and functionality, supporting spot trading and perpetual contracts, covering over 250 cryptocurrencies. Additionally, THENA provides liquidity support for protocols that need to expand on-chain liquidity. As of now, THENA has partnered with over 50 protocols on the BNB Chain, helping them manage liquidity through innovative incentive market mechanisms. I can share more details on this later.
From the very beginning, THENA has placed a strong emphasis on user experience. We designed the platform to be simple and intuitive, especially suitable for novice users, aiming to allow more people to easily enjoy the conveniences and opportunities that DeFi brings.
As for my background, my name is Adriano, and I have been working in the cryptocurrency field for nearly five years. I first encountered cryptocurrency during the ICO boom in 2017, initially as an ordinary investor. After experiencing the first bear market, I began to delve into blockchain technology and started providing consulting services for some projects in 2020. This experience made me realize that I wanted to create my own product.
Later, I developed a yield optimizer on the Fantom blockchain, which is still operational today but is now managed by another team. Since 2023, I have devoted myself entirely to building THENA. This journey has been filled with challenges and achievements, and I believe that THENA's journey has only just begun.
Odaily Planet Daily: Can you tell us how THENA was born and how it differs from other DEXs?
Theseus: Absolutely! As I mentioned earlier, before creating THENA, I developed a yield optimization protocol called Liquid Driver. At that time, we collaborated with many DEXs on various blockchains, which gave me a deep understanding of the importance of DEXs. In the DeFi ecosystem, exchanges can be considered the cornerstone of the entire industry; whether in DeFi, GameFi, or other crypto fields, on-chain liquidity is crucial whenever tokens are involved. The core mission of a DEX is to enable users to easily access and trade these tokens while providing the infrastructure to support ecosystem innovation.
At that time, I was inspired by the renowned DeFi builder Andre Cronje, who introduced a model called "ve(3,3)," which rapidly grew to have over $1 billion in TVL in a short period. However, due to flaws in its tokenomics and frontend design, it ultimately failed. Nevertheless, I saw the enormous potential of this model validated by the market, so I decided to improve it, learn from its lessons, and reimplement it on another chain using our own approach. Thus, THENA was born.
THENA differs from other DEXs mainly in the following aspects:
Innovative ve(3,3) Model:
THENA is not just a DEX serving liquidity providers and traders; it is also a B2B2C platform. THENA collaborates closely with many protocols, helping them scale their liquidity strategies through innovative incentive markets and the ve(3,3) model. This model provides efficient liquidity solutions for protocols while offering users more attractive reward mechanisms.
Advanced AMM Products:
THENA integrates the industry's best and most advanced automated market maker (AMM) models. THENA offers various liquidity models, including concentrated liquidity (similar to Uniswap v3), classic AMM (Uniswap v2), and upcoming weighted pool AMM and Meta stable pools. These AMM models can provide efficient and deep liquidity for various tokens.
User-Friendly Platform:
From the very beginning, THENA has made user experience a core focus. The THENA platform allows both novice and experienced users to easily trade and earn. Advanced liquidity management tools simplify the process of providing concentrated liquidity, lowering the entry barrier for new users.
Deep Partnership Building:
THENA is not just a trading platform; our team also places great importance on practice and building partnerships. We have established close relationships with multiple protocols on the BNB Chain, assisting them in their development journey. THENA is not just an exchange; it is also a business development hub on the BNB Chain.
It is these characteristics that allow THENA to stand out from other DEXs, becoming a leader in the DeFi space and an important driver of BNB Chain ecosystem development.
Odaily Planet Daily: Can you share how THENA handles revenue distribution and what makes it unique compared to other DEXs?
Theseus: Of course! Let's start with a quick comparison, which has been a long-discussed topic in the DEX space—how should we distribute the revenue of a DEX? The revenue distribution of a DEX involves two main parties: token holders and liquidity providers, the latter of whom need to be reasonably compensated for providing liquidity. In terms of tokenomics, different platforms have different models. For example, Uniswap adopts a model of "0% revenue distribution to token holders," while PancakeSwap uses a hybrid model, where a portion of the fees goes to liquidity providers and a small portion is allocated to token holders.
At THENA, we have chosen a unique distribution method—100% of the revenue generated by the DEX is distributed to token holders, while liquidity providers receive returns through the platform's token incentive mechanism.
How is this achieved? To unlock the full utility of the tokens, users need to lock their tokens. The locking period can range from two weeks to two years. The longer the locking period, the greater the governance weight held by the token holders. Users who lock their tokens can vote weekly to decide the distribution of liquidity mining rewards. For example, a user might allocate 50% of their votes to one pool and the other 50% to another pool. At the end of the week, based on the voting results, the mining rewards for the next week will be distributed to each pool in proportion to the votes. If a certain pool receives 50% of the voting weight, it will receive 50% of the weekly rewards.
Why is this important? This model encourages token holders to vote in support of pools that can generate more fees and rewards, thereby maximizing returns. They can earn a portion of the trading fees from that pool as well as additional voting rewards. This incentive mechanism naturally aligns the behavior of token holders towards allocating mining rewards to the most profitable pools, and over time, this dynamic adjustment significantly enhances the overall profitability of the DEX.
A Win-Win Ecosystem
This design creates a win-win situation between token holders and liquidity providers:
Token Holders: By locking their tokens, they not only gain access to the full revenue of the DEX but also participate in the platform's growth through governance.
Liquidity Providers: Through the incentive mechanism, they still receive sustainable, predictable, and competitive returns, which is crucial for attracting and retaining liquidity.
The high consistency of this stakeholder incentive mechanism makes THENA a platform that is completely different from other DEXs.
THENA has also achieved significant results: Since its inception, THENA has generated over $26 million in revenue, which is a substantial figure. Given our recent rapid growth, this number is expected to grow exponentially in the future.
Odaily Planet Daily: THENA has always been a community-driven project. How is this principle reflected? How does THENA give back to users? What are the future plans to strengthen community participation?
Theseus: The community-oriented principle of THENA is deeply rooted in our release strategy and operational philosophy. From day one of the project, we have placed great importance on the power of the community and have given back and reinforced this sense of participation in various ways.
1. Community-Driven Release Strategy
It all starts with THENA's release strategy. As I mentioned earlier, THENA is a B2B2C platform that initially introduced 22 protocols and allocated initial locked tokens to them, allowing these protocols to meet their liquidity needs through guided emissions. This collaboration not only helped the protocols achieve their liquidity goals but also brought their users into the THENA ecosystem.
Additionally, THENA conducted a large-scale airdrop during the launch phase, distributing tokens to users already active in DeFi, directly aligning the interests of the community with the platform's development.
2. Innovative NFT Strategy
Furthermore, we launched an innovative fundraising campaign—a visually appealing NFT series. These NFTs are not only beautifully designed but also allow holders to share a portion of THENA's revenue. The revenue distribution ratio will gradually decrease over time, but it has still become an important return mechanism for early supporters.
It is worth mentioning that THENA launched this NFT series during the peak of the bear market when market liquidity and demand were very low. However, the value of these NFTs has since increased by over 10 times, providing substantial returns to early investors, who are primarily community members, early users of the platform, or DAO participants.
3. Ongoing Community Interaction and Rewards
From the beginning, THENA has been community-centric, and this philosophy is deeply embedded in our operational approach. For example, THENA provides beta versions of upcoming features, inviting core users to participate in testing and provide feedback to help us improve the product. THENA maintains continuous communication with the community because we believe this is the best way to iterate on products and provide the best experience for users.
To give back to the community, THENA continuously runs various reward programs, such as bi-weekly Zealy (formerly Crew3) events, distributing over $6,000 in rewards for each event. THENA believes that the community is our strongest ally in marketing. Interestingly, some community members even proactively initiate their own events, using their rewards to attract new users and educate them. This spontaneous participation is very impressive and has begun to show significant results.
This success is attributed to the collaborative efforts of THENA's marketing team led by 0xApollo and the community-oriented approach. Rather than taking the traditional venture capital route and artificially inflating data at launch, THENA chooses to focus on building a long-term, loyal user base. These users not only invest or provide liquidity but also actively help us improve the product. Understanding user needs has been crucial to our achievements.
Future Plans: To further enhance community participation, we will also launch an ambassador program to formalize our collaboration with some of the most active users. Additionally, we will introduce more incentive activities in the coming weeks, so please follow our Twitter and Discord, where we will announce all updates.
Odaily Planet Daily: What are the important milestones for THENA in 2025 and beyond? How will these milestones shape THENA's success?
Theseus: The biggest milestone coming up for THENA is the migration to version V3. The development of this version has been ongoing for six months, and the audit is complete; we are finalizing the last details, planning to start the migration by the end of this year or early next year. This upgrade will bring significant improvements to THENA and transform us from a DEX into a potential financial super app.
One of the highlights of V3 is the introduction of "Hooks." Simply put, Hooks are smart contracts deployed on specific liquidity pools that allow any logic to be executed when users interact with the pool (whether trading, adding, or withdrawing liquidity). This opens up endless possibilities for innovation.
For example, Hooks can enable:
Advanced order types, such as limit orders.
Complex applications, such as building margin trading or leveraged yield farming directly on liquidity pools.
Customized requirements, such as requiring specific pools to complete KYC, which is crucial for bringing real-world assets or securities into on-chain trading.
These features will open a new door for THENA, allowing us to further develop and begin bringing traditional finance (TradFi) into the on-chain trading world.
What excites me the most is that the significance of V3 goes beyond the migration itself. Once V3 is live, we expect to attract a large number of developers and builders who will propose innovations based on the THENA platform that even exceed our imagination. THENA has been designed as a collaborative platform from the start. In addition to the core team, many external developers are utilizing our technological infrastructure to develop other applications.
In DeFi, network effects are very important. The more we collaborate with others, the greater the value of the platform and user base. By migrating to V3 and enabling Hooks, we are inviting developers to innovate directly on THENA's infrastructure. This will make THENA a one-stop financial platform, offering users a wide range of functional choices.
Our goals remain consistent:
For Traders: Provide the best user experience and the most competitive prices.
For Partner Protocols: Provide the best tools for managing liquidity and achieving innovation.
DEXs are the backbone of DeFi, providing the necessary foundational layer for other on-chain applications. By opening the platform with Hooks, THENA can iterate and innovate faster than ever, launching a series of features that provide immense value to users and protocols.
I am very excited about the next phase and am confident that it will shape THENA's success while driving our continuous growth and redefining the rules in this space.
Odaily Planet Daily: The DeFi market is clearly evolving rapidly. How do you view its current state, and what trends do you think will shape its future?
Theseus: I am more excited about the prospects of DeFi now than ever before. I believe we are on the brink of DeFi Summer 2.0. Those who experienced DeFi Summer 1.0 may remember it as an exciting time filled with innovation and economic experimentation. Although many attempts failed, some successful products became flagship offerings in the industry, such as DEXs like Uniswap, key money markets, and stablecoins. In the first wave, we did discover some strong product-market fit, but the infrastructure at that time was not mature, and the entire industry was still in its early stages. However, DeFi today is almost ready to welcome the next billion users. While there is still work to be done, significant advancements in infrastructure are bridging the critical gap between TradFi and DeFi.
Key trends shaping the future:
Tokenization of RWA Assets:
A recent trend that has garnered significant attention is the tokenization of real-world assets. At THENA, we have invested considerable effort in this area. For example, a key partner of THENA, Brickken, is developing solutions to make our DEX more friendly to asset tokenization issuers. This not only ensures compliance but also provides strong market-making capabilities and trading markets for these assets. This field will accelerate with the migration to THENA V3, which I am very much looking forward to.
The Combination of AI and DeFi:
Artificial intelligence also holds immense potential in DeFi. Some liquidity managers are experimenting with AI-driven tools to optimize liquidity management. In the future, we expect to see these innovative applications on the THENA platform.
Decentralized Identity and Credit Scoring:
The introduction of decentralized identity systems will be a key development, especially crucial for enabling unsecured loans. Currently, most money markets still rely on over-collateralization due to the lack of on-chain identity and credit scoring systems. Addressing this issue will allow us to introduce more TradFi-like products and accelerate the adoption of DeFi.
Improving User Experience (UX):
If DeFi wants to welcome the next billion users, it must simplify the user experience. Currently, the typical process is too complex for newcomers, including creating accounts on centralized exchanges (CEX), completing KYC, transferring funds, and learning how to use DeFi products.
THENA is working to simplify this process. Through innovations such as account abstraction, gas abstraction, and intent-based systems, we are eliminating these complexities. For example, THENA allows users to get started directly through our DEX without first going through a CEX. These improvements will make DeFi more user-friendly and accessible to the average user.
By 2025, I expect these innovations to be widely adopted across various protocols, significantly enhancing UX and infrastructure levels. DeFi will better integrate with TradFi, support on-chain trading of RWAs, and offer a richer suite of financial products. This is an exciting time for the entire industry. As THENA focuses on leading these innovations, I believe we will play a key role in shaping DeFi Summer 2.0 and its future development.
Odaily Planet Daily: What has been the biggest challenge you faced in building the ecosystem, and how did you overcome it?
Theseus: I wouldn't say there is just one specific challenge, but rather several major challenges:
1. Intense Market Competition
The competition in the DeFi market is exceptionally fierce. Over the past year, we have seen a surge of L2 chains and the ongoing development of many L1 chains, each with its own incentive and branding plans. This environment has led to liquidity capital hopping—funds jumping from one chain to another in pursuit of short-term gains.
Similarly, developers also jump between different chains seeking funding and opportunities. In the open-source industry, competitors can easily fork protocols and launch similar products, making it difficult to maintain a competitive edge.
As a founder, it is very challenging to gain a loyal user base willing to use your platform long-term rather than leaving for short-term higher yields. The fragmentation of the ecosystem increases user acquisition costs and undermines sustainability.
Our solution is community-centric. THENA's long-term supporters understand our vision and have witnessed our sustained execution over the past two years. They believe that THENA can provide products centered on user experience and value rather than short-term gains. This approach has helped us build a loyal user base.
2. Team Expansion
Building the right team is another major challenge. DeFi requires expertise. For example, in business development, I prefer to hire individuals with a financial background since we are a DEX. To effectively collaborate with other protocols, team members need to communicate in financial terms.
However, the best candidates often lack DeFi experience, which necessitates a learning process. The marketing department faces similar issues—it's challenging to find talent that understands our industry and is familiar with the relevant tools.
Additionally, as a distributed team, our members come from Europe, Asia, and South America, which brings its own coordination challenges. From hiring individuals to building a cohesive team, this process is not easy. However, I am proud to say that we have found our working rhythm and are ready to scale further.
3. Managing Community Expectations
As a community-centric protocol, maintaining transparent communication is crucial, but it also presents corresponding challenges. There is often information asymmetry between the team and the community. When things are going well, everyone is happy. But when difficulties arise, the community may criticize issues that are actually being resolved internally. This information gap can be frustrating at times, as we cannot share all details with everyone due to operational or strategic constraints. Balancing short-term goals with long-term strategy while maintaining community trust is especially challenging during tough times.
How do we overcome these challenges? We address these difficulties by emphasizing consistency, as much transparency as possible, and a long-term vision. We prioritize building strong relationships with the community while continuously improving our products and team collaboration. These efforts have helped us overcome these challenges and enabled THENA to achieve sustainable growth and success.
Odaily Planet Daily: Finally, is there anything else you would like to share with the THENA community, investors, and supporters?
Theseus: First of all, we are incredibly grateful for the support everyone has given us. Over the past two years, we have spent most of our time in a bear market, and having such an amazing community means the world to THENA. Our community has not only shown strong support but has also proactively helped, such as promoting products, educating new users, and providing feedback. The contributions of the THENA community are vital to our growth. Without them, we wouldn't be where we are today.
We are also very pleased to see all the new users joining us. THENA has an amazing community and an excellent admin team, ready to guide you and answer any questions you may have about the platform.
As I mentioned earlier, the listing on Binance is just one of our milestones. Now that we have gained more attention and recognition, we will leverage this opportunity together to build the best decentralized exchange on the BNB chain and across the entire ecosystem. Thank you all for your unwavering support!
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