International travel is complicated and littered with obstacles such as passports, visas, tickets and the like. An additional headache these days is keeping connected in foreign countries. Anyone who travels frequently will recount tales of terror involving huge mobile phone bills when returning home from an overseas trip.
If you are locked into a contract by the provider in your home country, you will have to roam when you travel and there is no escape. If you are not locked into a contract and you can use a local SIM card or a roaming SIM card, you will get disconnected from your friends, family and important messages. TripAlly is promising to put an end to these issues forever and liberate travelers from the purveyors of international roaming.
Crowdfunding to provide seamless global internet
TripAlly wants to use the initial coin offering (ICO) route to gather funds for building their platform. This platform would not only allow travelers to use internet across borders but also avail of other services like taxi, currency exchange and information services. TripAlly will be launching Ally Token, which is an ERC20 token issued on the Ethereum blockchain to raise funds.
A total of 100 mln Ally tokens would be distributed initially. Any left over tokens from the pre-ICO and ICO will be burned. The initial price that has been fixed is 0.005 ETH per Ally token, or 200 Ally tokens per 1 ETH. While the pre-ICO is still running until October 15th, the ICO will begin on October 15, 2017 and last until November 30, 2017. There are discounts available for early buyers during the ICO period.
Details on fund allocation, discounts and future plans are available in a detailed whitepaper that TripAlly has released. Ally’s services will be first launched in South-East Asian countries such as Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar, Laos and Malaysia.
Buyers may make predictable gains
Investors stand to benefit from the TripAlly ICO in multiple ways. In order to gain a better understanding of the advantages of this crowdfunding effort we talked with Aleksey Gordienko, the CEO and Co-Founder of TripAlly, who explains that there be a fixed return on the ICO as the minimum price of the Ally Token will be $3 after the ICO. Additionally, he pointed out that the token will be liquid and can be traded on the exchanges. Gordienko says:
“The main benefit for investors purchasing ALLY token is imminent financial gain after the ICO and, once the TripAlly Internet service becomes available in Asia the price of one ALLY token will be no less than $3. One ALLY token is equivalent to one day of mobile internet on TripAlly’s platform. For those who don’t have ALLY coins, prices will be set at $3 per day of mobile internet. At the pre-ICO stage we sell ALLY tokens with deep discounts, resulting in a price per token between $0.50 and $0.60 cents. This structure guarantees an exceptional ROI for the purchasers of ALLY tokens.”
TripAlly claims that the return on investment (ROI) may be as high as 400%. Talking about the transferability and liquidity of the coin Gordienko adds:
“The second important point is that every purchaser of ALLY tokens becomes our promoter (in terms of marketing) and distributor; we don’t prohibit the transfer/resell of ALLY tokens within TripAlly platform, besides cryptocurrency exchanges.”
Investors who want to purchase tokens can head to the website and get information on the purchase procedure.
Why TripAlly really matters
TripAlly is not just about cheap internet for people who go abroad. In fact, it is a comprehensive platform with tie ups in the South-East Asian region in place already. They will provide Internet through a mobile application on your existing home network SIM card using mobile telephone partnerships with networks in destination countries. They will also help you convert currency as they act as an exchange.
Transportation will be provided through partnerships with Uber and other providers. Tickets to attractions will be available for users as well. It is basically the only travel application a user will possibly need. Travelers get to choose whether they want to purchase Internet and other services before they leave or they can gain access when they arrive at major airports and border crossings.
Aleksey commented on how the services will be made available:
“Services will be available at major airports of departure and in every airport of arrival where TripAlly services are present, and, eventually in every major airport. There is no restriction from TripAlly when and where our clients can use services. Travelers can purchase TripAlly services before the departure date, at the point of arrival or during their stay in the country. The activation of TripAlly Internet services happens instantly after the payment process is completed.”
A comprehensive presentation explains the nitty gritty of how it all comes together.
Everybody hates roaming
If there is one aspect of mobile telephony that everyone can agree to hate, it’s be international roaming. It is expensive, unpredictable and makes even the hardiest traveler cringe in pain. Providing seamless internet coverage with just one application would be a godsend. We asked Aleksey what he thought would be the biggest challenge that TripAlly would like to tackle and here is what he had to say:
“Roaming has such a negative word to people that we have banned it from our vocabulary in the company. The existing solution for travelers to obtain mobile internet could be categorized into four major categories:
- Roaming, which everyone hates;
- Local or global SIM-cards, which are inconvenient because there are many services attached to your original SIM-card;
- Local Wi-Fi, which suffers from security problems and geolocation restrictions, and which you can’t take with you to the beach or the park;
- Pocket Wi-Fi/Hotspot, which requires the user to purchase an expensive internet package and carry an extra device all the time. It’s also difficult to share connectivity with others.
There were 1.2 billion travelers around the world in 2016 and that number is constantly increasing. At TripAlly we believe that everyone who travels should have access to cheap and unlimited mobile Internet. Travelers should not have to worry about staying connected with their loved ones whilst they travel, and they should be able to share their travel experience instantly. It will make the travel industry better and contribute to the freedom of travelling!”
If TripAlly can sort out the pains of travel, its investors will surely have a lot to gain. It will be interesting to see how they go about doing it.
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