Moonriver, the sister network of the Moonbeam network, is a decentralized smart contract platform built as a parachain on Kusama. MOVR is the name and ticker symbol of Moonriver's native token.
The Moonriver network was launched on Kusama in June 2021. Much like the way Kusama acts as a canary network to Polkadot, Moonriver acts as a fully incentivized platform for testing new projects before they are deployed on Moonbeam.
The platform mirrors Ethereum's ecosystem regarding its Web3 RPC, accounts, password systems, subscriptions, documentation, Ethereum wallets, and developer tools. As a result, any Ethereum project can be replicated and deployed on Moonriver with low gas fees and at a faster speed.
Moonriver and Moonbeam try to maintain the same level of decentralization and security as their respective relay chains, Polkadot and Kusama. Moonriver has over 900 validators on its network and is the most active DeFi ecosystem on the Kusama mainnet. In addition, Moonriver and Moonbeam also have an emerging DeFi ecosystem with DEXs, lending and borrowing protocols, automated market makers (AMMs), staking protocols, launchpad, and more.
The primary use case of Moonriver is incentivizing collators and participants who run the core decentralized node infrastructure for smart contract execution. The platform also adopted a fully decentralized governance system from the beginning, where token holders use MOVR to govern the platform by proposing updates, electing council members, and voting on proposals.
MOVR price and tokenomics
The total supply of MOVR was 10 million at launch. The maximum supply is uncapped, with an annual inflation rate of 5 percent. The token inflation pays for network functions, including incentivizing collators, paying for the parachain slot on its relay chain, and rewarding token stakers.
In August 2021, 30 percent of MOVR tokens were distributed back to participants in the MOVR parachain auction on Kusama. The remaining 70 percent was reserved for developers, community initiatives, and other essential teams.
80 percent of the fees accrued from transactions and smart contract executions on the platform are burned, which creates a temporary deflation that affects MOVR's price. The other 20 percent is transferred to the treasury for community-voted projects.
About the founders
The Moonbeam Foundation financially backs both Moonbeam and Moonriver. Derek Yoo, an alumnus of the University of Pennsylvania, is the founder and CEO of these networks. Stefan Mehlhorn, the COO of both networks, has also founded two companies, Collego and Permessa. Alan Sapede, who has prior experience at companies like Google, Fuze, and Live Minutes, handles blockchain engineering.
All three team members have worked in the same roles for Pure Stake, an IT service body that also develops and powers Moonbeam.
