Exclusive Interview with John, Head of the TON Foundation Asia-Pacific: Telegram Will Build a Privacy-Friendly AI Computing Network Based on TON

Compiled by: ZEN, PANews

TON was one of the most important players in the cryptocurrency industry last year.

At the beginning of this year, TON’s official status was reaffirmed, becoming the sole designated blockchain infrastructure for Telegram mini apps. The two parties also jointly proposed an ambitious vision to onboard 30% of Telegram’s over one billion users onto the TON blockchain by 2028.

Following this deep “integration,” the TON ecosystem may not be as hot as last year, but several trending topics have still emerged. The most eye-catching is the digital collectible “Telegram Gifts” (similar to QQ Show)—in July, hip-hop artist Snoop Dogg turned his likeness into a limited Gift, selling nearly one million units in 30 min, with sales reaching about $12 million.

Telegram founder Pavel Durov publicly described these Gifts as “social network-native NFTs,” rather than traditional avatar images circulating only within the crypto community.

Additionally, TON continues to advance in payments, retail Decentralized Finance, Earn, RWA, AI, and other areas, focusing on social products and IP, and upgrading Mini App capabilities. Telegram and TON’s path is often compared to a “global version of WeChat,” and in this narrative, the Asia-Pacific region is crucial: it best understands the “WeChat-style growth model” and knows how to combine mini apps, payments, and social features to create a commercial closed loop.

Recently, PANews interviewed John, TON Foundation’s Asia-Pacific lead, covering how he brought the first batch of Chinese-speaking teams into the TON ecosystem, and the progress in payments, Decentralized Finance, digital identification collectibles, RWA, and AI. Regarding support for startup teams, John also mentioned that TON actually has a phased support system for projects, internally called the “service triangle.”

John: Starting from Zero with TON Foundation

John joined TON Foundation about three years ago, responsible for the Asia-Pacific region. All work related to the Chinese-speaking community was built from scratch by him and his team.

In the early days, John worked in major internet companies on investment and innovation, with a diverse background. During that period, he researched sectors including e-commerce, short video, social, and online education, and due to work needs, he also thoroughly experienced and studied the WeChat ecosystem. “Actually, the WeChat ecosystem has spawned many unicorn companies, some of which have become globally significant, the most typical being Pinduoduo, and later Yunji, Shuidichou, Youzan, Weimob, which all listed on the NYSE,” John added.

“This experience was one of the main reasons I later joined the TON ecosystem.” John revealed that he felt TON’s ecosystem might have similarities with WeChat’s in the future. On the other hand, he gradually became skeptical of Web2 business models’ value and growth potential, so he shifted to Web3, initially working at an exchange on token listing and investment.

In 2022, when TON Foundation was just established, they were looking for someone who understood both Web2 and Web3, with experience in investment and business, and John was a good fit, so he joined the team. “At that time, TON was almost starting from zero—even the familiar Telegram built-in Wallet hadn’t launched yet, but I actually thought the early stage was the best time to join.”

Besides the above reasons, John said he also had a “sense of mission” at TON—China had about 7 million mini apps and 3 million mini app Developers in 2021; if even 10% could be converted to the Web3 world, it would be a huge increase. He hoped to bring outstanding mini apps and WeChat ecosystem entrepreneurs to TON to serve global users. In fact, by 2024, the Telegram mini app ecosystem has already brought over $1 billion in income to third-party Developers.

Chinese-Speaking Region Produces TON Ecosystem Star Products

As Asia-Pacific lead, John’s main focus includes major project BD, ecosystem team support and incubation, and team building. Additionally, John and his team are responsible for event sponsorship, regional operations, and keeping headquarters updated in Real Time on Chinese-speaking Developers’ needs and progress.

“So we have another task: to continuously inform Dubai headquarters about what Chinese-speaking startup teams really care about, and what we should do to survive and grow in this complex and huge market.” Over three years, Chinese-speaking teams have built trust internally, and several projects have successfully stood out in the TON ecosystem.

The most representative is the cat-themed Telegram game Catizen. “I personally BD’d this project,” John said. The team originally came from the WeChat mini game ecosystem and is very familiar with mini app distribution logic and social network propagation mechanisms. They started on Solana, but due to occasional chain congestion, later switched to TON and grew rapidly. Their token has already been listed on major exchanges like Binance.

John noted that between late 2022 and 2023, he personally spoke with at least 200 Chinese-speaking teams. But in the end, fewer than 10 were willing to build on TON. During 2023, TON was still in a very early, “pioneering” stage—little reputation, few teams, and few Developers.

He said, “It wasn’t until 2024 that we saw a real explosive rise. Honestly, the vast majority of Chinese-speaking users only truly learned about TON in 2024.” When the Tap2Earn model took off, many other L1\2s connected with mini games, and through token listing, brought tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of new users to major exchanges at once. Because overseas internet platforms are not as closed as WeChat, they didn’t react in time. When exchanges saw new user numbers drop, they stopped listing tokens, causing TON’s wave of popularity to fade, but helping other L1\2s gain a large number of users and Assets.

Payments Unlocked in the TON Ecosystem

In Q2 this year, TON Foundation prioritized support for five key verticals: payments, Decentralized Finance, GameFi, in-app economy, and AI Agent.

John believes that in the WeChat system, payments are “the foundation of the foundation,” and the TON ecosystem follows the same logic. He pointed out that TON is currently focusing on three directions to find startup teams: convenient P2P transfers and “on-chain Gift Coins” mechanisms, allowing users to complete Signature, send, and receive Assets directly in Telegram groups; global deposit service providers and USDT bank card integration to drop the entry barrier for newcomers; and advancing B2B cross-border trade Settlement, embedding Stablecoin into foreign trade payment processes to serve overseas merchants.

“Chinese people understand this best, because WeChat Pay is the foundation of the WeChat ecosystem,” John said. Payments are the essential foundation in the TON ecosystem. Only when this layer is unlocked can commercialization truly take off. John said the Foundation is currently designing gas-free Stablecoin on-chain transfers, so users no longer need to worry about gas fees when transferring; they are also actively bringing in fiat deposit partners from around the world.

For smoother P2P transfers of Assets on TON, some teams have already built “on-chain Signature Gift Coins” based on the TON Wallet. Users can set up a Gift Coin pool, drop a mini app bot into a group, and group members can click to grab cryptocurrency.

He pointed out that many people misunderstand WeChat Pay’s main use case as offline spending, but actually about 80% of transaction volume comes from P2P transfers, group Gift Coins, and other “social payments,” with only about 20% being offline purchases or online shopping.

Therefore, he believes that TON is naturally embedded in Telegram, a super social network, and this “social capital flow” is an advantage other blockchains don’t have. So TON will continue to focus deeply in this area—not only will TON Wallet launch products, but more teams are encouraged to build Gift Coin and transfer mini apps or bots to grow social P2P payments. Meanwhile, USDC is also ready to launch.

Decentralized Finance: Earn for Everyday Users

In Decentralized Finance, John pointed out that TON’s positioning for Decentralized Finance this year is clear: “on-chain Earn for everyday people” (Retail Decentralized Finance), similar to Yu’e Bao’s “stable return” products, not high-risk plays.

Now, opening the TON Wallet in Telegram, you’ll see the “Earning” section, which already features some products. For example, USDe: USEe has been issued on TON, with TVL over $200 million. Normal annualized Return is about 6%–9%, but during the early promotion phase, with subsidies, it can reach 16%–19%. John said the first round of subsidies has ended, and the next round will be tied to “social referral.” “Using multi-level social viral growth to acquire new users is very much in line with TON’s social distribution advantage.”

Besides Stablecoin Return products, TON has also launched tokenized gold Assets this year, packaged as a selectable Earn Asset in the Wallet. Next, TON will tokenize Telegram’s corporate bonds as RWA Assets. John revealed that TON has already been running this on the institutional side for several months, aiming to add it to “Earning” so everyday users can directly allocate it. Additionally, yield Assets on TON can now be used as Collateral for Decentralized Finance lending protocols.

On the DEX side, TON has completed both CFMM and CLMM models. John said the TON ecosystem now has a CLMM-based DEX called TONCO. The project launched late, but now accounts for 32% of TON ecosystem DEX volume, with cumulative Trading Fee income over $1 million and volume over $430 million, making it a core Liquidity gateway.

“So this year, the Decentralized Finance sector has fully built its foundation, including Lending, CDP, LSD, stableswap, Bridge, Prep DEX, Vaults, and the Chainlink Oracle Machine launching early next year.” John said the next step is to repackage these complex “Decentralized Finance Legos” in a more user-friendly way, add social referral, and turn them into Earn products that everyday users can easily understand and use with one click.

Telegram Gift: IP Assets and Digital Identification Economy

In the interview, John focused on Telegram Gift, which is TON’s hottest direction this year.

Gift isn’t just a static avatar image, but a full set of wearable, displayable “digital identification collectibles”: you can wear them on your Telegram profile page and add exclusive theme backgrounds to chat windows.

John said that popular items like “Plush PEPE” now have a floor Unit Price close to $10,000, with the highest rise about 400x, and only about 2,000 units. Its value comes from two points: scarcity + social flex. As Gift popularity continues to rise, the TON ecosystem has seen many Gift secondary Marketplace mini apps emerge. “Later, the official team built their own secondary Marketplace, but interestingly, third-party mini apps in the ecosystem actually achieved higher trading volume.” Currently, the Gifts market size has reached several hundred million dollars.

“We’re now working to move All Gift trades on-chain for Equity Confirmation,” John said. Some TON ecosystem mini apps already allow direct on-chain trading of these GiftNFTs. The core change is: when a Gift goes from a “small present worth a few bucks” to a “scarce Asset with a Unit Price of tens of thousands of dollars,” users naturally care about on-chain Equity Confirmation and true ownership.

“We have a well-performing secondary Marketplace mini app called Tonnel, supporting Maker, bid, and instant Trade for each Gift.” John added that financial plays have even emerged around these rare Gifts: some use high-value Gifts as Collateral, pawning them for USDT; or rent out Gifts for rental income. This business was initially called GIFI AUCTION, since most regular Telegram users don’t understand Decentralized Finance, but was later renamed Rent to make the rental income mechanism more intuitive.

Besides Gifts, TON has also made Stickers into NFTs, usable directly in Telegram. Well-known IPs like Azuki and Pudgy Penguins have launched their own Sticker NFTs on TON. Additionally, the recently launched TON NFT 2.0 protocol allows NFT issuers to set future secondary Marketplace Royalties, so IP owners can continuously earn Commission from NFT secondary Trades, better incentivizing IP Creators. To support this, the Foundation created the official Sticker store: FUSE.

John noted that after Pudgy Penguins released their Stickers, they extended further by launching a co-branded mini game. “This matches a trend we’re seeing: in the WeChat mini game system, WeChat is also pushing IP co-branded mini games. The reason is simple—IP brings its own traffic, making user acquisition cheaper; and IP can extend the mini game’s lifecycle, improving user retention.”

AI Agent Economy: Companionship, Rental, and Trading Services

The combination of AI with blockchain and cryptocurrency has always been a key area of industry exploration. Telegram is actually the most natural large internet platform to integrate Chatbot—with the world’s best bot API. John said the ecosystem has already spawned some “AI species”—bots powered by large models, interacting with a billion users via chat interfaces, and developing faster than the official team expected.

For example, there’s an app called StarAI in the TON ecosystem.

When users feel the character they’ve created is valuable, they can Mint it as an on-chain NFT. “So you’re not just a player, but also an agent. You can scout and polish an AI persona with market value, use the character to chat with others and earn money, and Creators can share in the revenue. If someone believes in the character’s long-term value, they can even buy the whole character as an IP NFT and Favorite it in their TON Wallet in Telegram.”

This is essentially “agent economy”—the AI character itself is a commercialized IP, which can be operated, shared, and transferred. John said the StarAI team has been operating for over a year, with real income (no token issuance) and stable hundreds of thousands of active users. He thinks this is very important—it shows that on TON, people are making money from pure product services, not just from token issuance and speculation.

In addition, at last Wednesday’s Blockchain Life conference in Dubai, Telegram’s founder announced the launch of Cocoon(Confidential Compute Open Network) protocol—a decentralized network for secure, privacy-protecting AI inference computation. Through this network, AI app Developers can Use TON tokens to pay GPU owners to process inference requests. Telegram itself will be the first major client to Use Cocoon for confidential AI requests.

With Cocoon, AI Developers get low-cost Hash Power/Hash Rate, can Use user data without violating privacy, GPU suppliers receive TON tokens as rewards, and users enjoy AI apps without giving up privacy.

AI app Developers now only need to Link via DM with their planned model (e.g., DeepSeek, Qwen), desired daily request volume, and average Token input/output size; GPU owners wanting to earn TON tokens by contributing Hash Power/Hash Rate can also DM via the Link: specifying the number and model of GPUs (e.g., H200), VRAM, and machine working hours.

John said: “The network will launch this month. From now on, users no longer need to fully rely on training models that can steal data privacy or centralized large model companies that manipulate user behavior.”

At the same conference, Pavel Durov also announced that next year he will be more involved in TON blockchain’s core technology, along with other exciting news.

Building “Low-Risk, Stable Return” RWA

“In RWA, one direction we’re working on is Telegram corporate bonds,” John said. The basic idea is: tokenize Telegram’s high-quality corporate bonds (with 8–10% annualized Return, held by top global investment institutions), map them onto the TON chain as tradable on-chain Assets, and put them in the TON Wallet for users to choose like Earn products. This product is expected to launch for users by the end of this year or early next year, and users can also Use it in TON ecosystem Decentralized Finance protocols for higher Return.

“This is just the first step. We’ll also introduce more traditional financial Assets, such as working with Backed Finance and Kraken to gradually launch tokenized US stocks and ETFs in TON Wallets across different regions. These are the most easily understood ‘high cognition’ Assets for global everyday users. But we won’t just do traditional Wall Street Assets. We’re also exploring non-standard RWAs that better fit our ecosystem.”

John revealed that a team in Hong Kong is working on a ride-hailing mini app, with the idea of splitting “future autonomous vehicle fleets” into yield Assets that can be subscribed to in advance. Today’s taxi drivers can buy these “fleet shares” ahead of time, and when the fleet goes live, drivers can earn income based on revenue sharing, avoiding the impact of future autonomous driving unemployment.

In theory, this allows drivers to gradually shift from “trading time for money” to “owning productive Assets and enjoying dividends.” By splitting the revenue rights of a real-world car/fleet into yield certificates, drivers become “shareholders” ahead of time.

“So for us, RWA isn’t just about putting Wall Street Assets on-chain. It can also mean tokenizing AI machine Assets that greatly enrich real-world productivity, letting ordinary participants hold Return rights.”

John also said that TON’s RWA standards are completely different from traditional Decentralized Finance’s “the higher the Return, the better.” TON’s mainstream users are Telegram users, not necessarily crypto veterans. They care more about safety and stability, avoiding events like the USDe depeg on October 11, so we focus on Assets they can understand and trust.

Developer Support and the “Service Triangle”

Asia-Pacific has a large number of outstanding Developers, and this year TON launched the Telegram 2C app accelerator bootcamp to nurture high-quality mini game projects in the region. John said the mini game accelerator/bootcamp is just one part of support for Developers and entrepreneurs.

“We actually have a complete phased support system for projects globally, which we call the service triangle internally—from early-stage projects to scalable teams, each gets different levels of support.”

John said the bottom layer is teams just entering the ecosystem, still shaping their product or even just at the idea or pre-MVP stage. Workshops, small competitions, pitch events, and offline hub activities are the best stage for these newcomers. Teams with time can also join the incubator TON NEST.

Moving up to the second layer is the “growth stage”—teams with an MVP and a working product. At this stage, support upgrades from basic onboarding to mentorship. Simply put, it’s mentorship + official endorsement + resource matchmaking. For example: how to get Telegram official account/bot/mini app verification, exposure slots in the Telegram mini app store. This layer’s goal is to “bring the product to the surface,” turning a good idea/demo into a project with identity and credit endorsement.

The top layer is the third stage—scaling up. This stage is for teams that have already succeeded and are ready to expand. Support here is more like “1-on-1 resource opening”: securing Foundation funding, direct VC introductions, higher-level marketing, making them “representative projects of the TON ecosystem.” This layer is for Champions, and TON’s key bets.

John revealed that TON plans to restart the global hackathon next year, with internal design underway, aiming to make it better than previous editions. “This year, we didn’t do large-scale hackathons, to save resources and make next year’s more complete and systematic.”

“But the most important thing next year will definitely be all kinds of AI agent bots in the Telegram ecosystem. Because in any ecosystem, the founder decides the most important direction. And Telegram has the world’s best bot Developer ecosystem and hundreds of millions of users who want to protect their privacy data.” John said he believes that, combined with Pavel’s latest proposal for privacy-protecting AI inference Farm, AI projects will become the newest trend in the TON ecosystem.

“So, we hope to find more AI projects to thrive in Telegram, especially AIGC-powered prediction markets in social private domains, to meet the needs of regional long-tail markets not served by centralized Polymarket\Kashi.”