This proposal is thinking big and seems to have a good plan to get there.  They have teamed up with the vendor of 80% of the retail POS systems in Ukraine to provide integration of Bitcoin and Dash into real brick-and-mortar businesses, starting with restaurants.

Business Integration Into Retail Sector  Owner: sm  255 DASH ($90.80/D) $23,154 (added on 2017-05-11) Votes: 839 Yes / 149 No / 16 Abstain  Dash.org forum pre-proposal comments further discussion here.

Dash proposal clarification video by Slava and Dmitriy

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2nfz2auAJE]
There was a lot of discussion about the Dash treasury funding “another” POS system, I think the proposers laid out their reasoning pretty well.  It seems the masternode voters agreed.  Building the software and integrating into the stores will be the easy part of this project. That is pretty much completed as seen in this video demo of the system.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePqp2qj2k9c]
The hard part of the project is just starting – marketing to the retail stores and customers.  This is the classic chicken and egg thing – it doesn’t really matter which comes first you need both retail stores willing and able to take Dash and enough customers willing to spend Dash to keep the interest of the retailers.

From the demo video the “crypto payment module” they have developed seems to fit right into existing workflows – if employees use it everyday they will have no problem with training.  If only one crypto paying customer comes in each month it won’t go well.

I interviewed Dmitriy about the project.

I know you are working with Profit Solutions – in a video you say they have 80% of the retail POS system market in Ukraine – how many actual locations is that?

I cannot tell the exact number of locations because we don’t have that data. The good thing is that Profit Solutions is run not only on restaurants terminals but also on cinemas, gas stations, coffee shops and other retail businesses.

Will they all have access to the “crypto payment module” at some point?

Currently our strategy is to start with a few restaurants and get the response from both customers and the owners of those restaurants. However gradually we want to cover as much of those places as possible, and hopefully all of them.

The unique feature of our solution is that we don’t have to rely on Profit Solutions only. We have created a module that any existing POS terminal can use by making a few adjustments in their software.

During the process we encountered 2 big problems:

1) Legislation.  Cryptocurrency is not forbidden here but in order to accept it you have to spend quite some time to make accounting and taxation clear and transparent. Hopefully, our lawyers formalized documents that make an option of paying with cryptocurrency fully legal in our country.

2) Interest.  Despite the availability of a technical and legal solution, not all of the restaurants want to start accepting crypto. They don’t see enough benefits. However we believe once the momentum is created one place after another will start accepting crypto, there will be more and more interest from other business owners. Basically word of mouth is the best strategy here.  In any case, we have enough business relationships to get it all started and keep moving on.

You are using cryptocurrency exchange fork.sale to work with the system is that fully working?

Our exchange will receive crypto, and then send money to each restaurant’s bank account. Right now the restaurant cannot receive crypto and keep it because there will be problems in accounting and taxation if you make payment with cryptocurrency in our country. It’s not forbidden though but you still cannot do that 🙂

When do you expect to be “in production?” What is your roll out plan for going live?

Our first release is planned to be in 1-2 weeks. The terminals in the restaurants are already updated, we just need to make sure that everything works as it should. That’s why our primary focus right now is testing.  Our first restaurants are Givi Rubenshteyn, Pasteteca  and Celentano.

In your demo video you didn’t use InstantSend – would it work if you did? Does the system require waiting a specific number of confirmations before the sale is final?

Obviously InstantSend works and it works faster. In fact, we would probably suggest using it since this feature is now supported on both iPhone and Android.  Our system confirms that the payment has been made as soon as it appears on Dash’s blockchain. We don’t need to wait for more than 1 confirmation to make the order finished.

I see that Slava entered the proposal – what is your “business” relationship with him?

We’re working together in one company (Cryptogroup) that is focused on fintech services, ICOs and using cryptocurrency in real sectors of the economy.

My understanding is the Dash treasury funded the cost of developing the “crypto payment module” which seems to be complete.

For now the basic functionality of this module is ready. According to our lead software architect Ardrey Arsenin, there will be more updates in the system, interface and code.

What we found is that maintenance is the most important part to make everything work smoothly so we would probably hire an additional person for this activity only.

Also included was marketing, training and support for some amount of time how do you see that working? Are you the person that will be doing that?

A solid portion of the funds will be used on marketing. We do understand that such a solution (direct integration of crypto into existing POS terminals) hasn’t been done yet (unfortunately for the industry, fortunately for us). Most of the cryptocurrency payments in the world are made online so we have to change this. I heard only Japan has integrated Bitcoin in POS devices recently, the others either don’t value the true potential or simply don’t care.

I will definitely be involved in the process of training for staff, waiters and so forth in the first stages. However over time there will be a separate person who will do that specifically. The best format for training haven’t been defined yet.  We will try different approaches and see which one works the best.


Are the marketing and training materials ready  I think I saw some in your demo video?

The first version of booklets are finished and already printed out. Stickers, T-shirts and other things will be done pretty soon as well.

How did you come up with the idea for this project?

The idea for this project was not accidental. We know that many retail businesses are struggling right now. Giving them a chance to gain new clients by expanding their payment options can be really helpful.  Plus, our company has some decent connections with restaurant owners that can accelerate the speed of this particular integration.

Can you tell me a little bit about how you and Slava got into crypto – Dash?

Dmitriy:  My first introduction with cryptocurrency was in 2011 when one of my friends offered me to buy GPUs to mine Bitcoin. Obviously I rejected because I didn’t understand what he was talking about.

However in late 2015 I got back again and became really interested in where blockchain and cryptocurrency can be used. Over time I bought some Bitcoin and other altcoins, began mining Ethereum and started to blog on Steemit. Gradually I got deeper into this space and Dash in particular was the most promising project for me.

Long story short, I made a proposal to organize meetups throughout Ukraine and that’s when I met Slava. Later on I joined their team and now we’re both working in Cryptogroup on various Dash and blockchain-related projects.

Slava:  I’ve been in cryptocurrency space for a couple of years. Together with our team we started a news source about cryptocurrency, a series of video blogs and conferences, while focusing on simplicity and precision.

Currently my goal is to provide people with high-class content about the blockchain sphere, and I’m very glad that our projects bring DASH closer to the mass adoption.