How Onmeta Is Helping dApps Reach More Users By Simplifying Crypto Transactions

The rising digitisation and increase in the use of UPI and internet banking have enabled Web2 applications to monetise their services easily. However, the same cannot be said for the Web3 ecosystem, which has several bottlenecks such as a lack of interoperability between crypto and fiat currencies, expensive transaction costs and involvement of thousands of tokens, among others.

Payment enablers and aggregators for the Web3 ecosystem are scarce, but with Bengaluru-based Onmeta, the Web3 ecosystem is coming of age in the country. Founded in 2021 by Bharath T and Krishna Teja Nemani, Onmeta offers on-ramp and off-ramp solutions for decentralised applications (dApps), akin to any payment aggregator for the Web2 ecosystem.

It offers application programming interfaces (APIs) and widget integrations that essentially allow users to buy crypto tokens with fiat currencies (on-ramp) and sell crypto in exchange for fiat currencies (off-ramp).

One of the biggest challenges that the Web3 community faces is the lack of on-ramp and off-ramp solutions in crypto transactions for dApps on various blockchains. A user has to go through multiple crypto exchanges and transactions to buy the required token, which can be off-putting to users new to the Web3 ecosystem.

According to a report by DappRadar, the per day usage of dApps in 2021 surged to 2.7 Mn unique active wallets globally. The total industry activity increased 765% year-on-year (YoY). Interestingly, over 51% of the blockchain industry’s activity was accounted for by gaming dApps, while decentralised finance (DeFi) accounted for only 37%.

Onmeta’s APIs and widget integrations enable a dApp to allow users to purchase and sell the token within its ecosystem. Given the increasing dApp activity within the Web3 ecosystem, the startup’s solutions can allow many of them to scale up and easily monetise their services without losing users to the complexity.

So far, the startup has processed transactions worth more than $1 Mn since its product launch in April 2022, having been integrated into more than 15 dApps.

Earlier this month, Onmeta raised $1.5 Mn in a seed round led by Skycatcher Fund. Luno Expeditions, Polygon Studios and GSF Fund were the other institutional investors that took part in the round.

Several angel investors also joined the round, such as Sandeep Nailwal (Polygon founder), Ganesh Swami (Covalent CEO), Nitish Mittersain (Nazara founder), Madhur Deep (India Head, Alibaba) and Hiro Mashita (MD, Sin Growth Partners).

Prateek Gupta, business head at Onmeta, told Inc42 that the early-stage startup is planning to use the funding to build support for fiat currencies, eventually offering support for all major currencies, as well as for team expansion and community outreach.

How Onmeta Works?

Explaining the startup’s working, Gupta said that currently, a user has to figure out where the token he wants is available. Most of the tokens for dApps are available exclusively on a decentralised exchange (DEX), which makes the process all the more difficult, as a DEX does not allow users to buy crypto tokens with fiat currency.

That is, presently, a user has to do the following to go from fiat currency to a specific crypto token:

• Create a non-custodial wallet (such as Metamask)
• Buy a stablecoin (USDT, for instance) at an exchange using fiat currency
• Deposit the stablecoin in their non-custodial wallet
• Find the DEX which sells the token they are interested in (Uniswap, for instance)
• Map the wallet with the DEX
• Do a ‘token swap’ to exchange the stablecoin with the token required
• Withdraw the token into their wallet
• Connect the wallet with the dApp to use the token

The long-winded entry process ends up being a deterrent and dApps lose potential users due to it.

Gupta said that currently, a single crypto exchange supports only a few crypto tokens. However, there are more than 10,000 crypto tokens live across 30 blockchains. For emerging tokens, it is hard to achieve scale as crypto exchanges only support 300-400 tokens at one time. Onmeta claims to solve this by supporting more than 4,000 crypto tokens.

Gupta pointed out that Onmeta’s solution works similarly to any other payment gateway provider.

A user can go to a dApp that has Onmeta’s solution integrated and select the token he wishes to purchase. Next, the user will need to enter the amount for which he wants to purchase the token (for instance, if someone wants to purchase INR 100 worth of token, they need to enter 100 in the payment option), and then pay via UPI to Onmeta.

Once that is done, the user will be asked to provide the UPI transaction ID for Onmeta to verify. Once the verification is done at Onmeta’s end, it will deposit the token in the user’s crypto wallet within a minute or so.

Similarly, Onmeta also simplifies exits for users with its off-ramp integration in dApps. Users can exchange their holdings for INR within about a minute and the startup deposits the INR in the bank account linked by the user to the portal.

“Eventually, we want to be able to support every major fiat currency,” said Gupta about Onmeta’s plans. He added that the startup will be building support for other emerging markets around the world.

Bharath T, founder and CEO at Onmeta, said, “While most other on- and off-ramp service providers process payments in 5-10 minutes on an average, Onmeta has processed 91% of its transactions so far in less than 60 seconds, mirroring the current Web2 experience of instant payments.”

The startup uses a commission-based B2B business model, wherein it charges a transaction fee on every transaction that it processes. “It is typically 3% for on-ramp transactions and 1.5% for off-ramp transactions,” Gupta said.

Gupta said that Onmeta builds in tandem with the changing regulatory landscape so that dApps can focus on innovation and product and not worry about compliance issues. Onmeta complies with regulations including eKYC and anti-money laundering (AML) checks for all the transactions processed through its solutions, the business head said.

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