Alibaba Cloud, Near Foundation Agree to Collaborate on Asia’s Web3 Growth: Details

Web3 adoption, around the world, seems to be heating up with plenty happening around crypto rules and CBDC introductions in existing economies. Aiming to foster the growth of Web3 in Asia, the Near Foundation has entered a partnership with China’s Alibaba Group. Essentially, the Near Foundation is looking to use Alibaba’s Cloud solutions to help developers build on its blockchain infrastructure. The development comes at a time when more Web3 players are shifting their attention to the densely populated and tech savvy Asian continent.

Based in Zug, Switzerland, the Near Foundation is a non-profit organisation that oversees the funding, ecosystem development, as well as core governance of the Near blockchain. The Proof-of-Stake (PoS) blockchain is energy efficient and eco-friendly.

The Near Foundation is aiming to encourage more Web3 developers to use its blockchain to support their solutions and products. Its partnership with Alibaba Cloud aims to encourage developers from anti-crypto China to also hop onboard the Web3 wagon.

As part of their partnership, the Near Foundation and Alibaba Cloud will offer remote procedure calls (RPC) as a service to developers on the Near ecosystem. The RPC, which is a type of a computer server, lets users read blockchain data amongst other features, a Coindesk report said on Monday, June 26.

In addition, the infrastructure provided by Alibaba Cloud will enable Web3 developers to use Near’s Blockchain Operating System (BOS) to build on and connect with others using the ecosystem.

For Alibaba, this makes for an important deal signed under its executive vice chairman, Joseph Tsai. A vocal blockchain enthusiast, Tsai himself is reportedly a Web3 investor who has been analysing favourable deals with crypto-related organisations to bring into Alibaba’s partnerships portfolio.

For now, all crypto-related activities are banned in China. Hence it looks like blockchain solutions apart from the ones that simplify engagement with crypto, could brew strong among Chinese developers.

As far as Near is concerned, this is not its first foray into the Asian market.

In February this year it joined forces with Indian multi-media company Shemaroo Entertainment to bring immutability, transparency, as well as decentralisation to India’s entertainment and media sphere via blockchain.

Blockchains that aim to onboard gaming companies are also shifting their focus to Asia from the western markets.

Asia’s gaming community generates the maximum chunk of revenue in the industry. In its latest research report, DappRadar said the Asian nations of India, China, Japan, and South Korea collectively have over 1.7 billion video game players, and this big number has attracted players in the Web3 gaming space to shift their focus to the Asian market on priority.