SDF's Roadmap
Transformation
New tech, new capabilities, new opportunities
Ten years ago, the Stellar network began as a decentralized payment network with the infrastructure, features, and tools needed to enable fast, affordable, efficient payments. Since then, the network's ecosystem has delivered on the payment vision with a growing number of asset issuers, on and off-ramps, and wallets. As the ecosystem has grown so has the utility it delivers solving real problems people face every day. This focused design and feature set is responsible for nearly half a billion assets on the network, billions of transactions, and some of the industry's brightest use cases. This clarity of purpose and the hard work put in place – while not glamorous – has set Stellar apart as a utility leader.
Now on the cusp of a decade of success, we are taking the next step in pursuit of the Stellar Development Foundation's mission of greater access to the financial system. Built on the foundation of an incredible payments network that is low cost, fast and built to scale, and the global reach to a growing share of the world's underserved population, we are expanding the network's offerings and value proposition for builders by integrating smart contract capabilities. This move will fundamentally transform the Stellar tech stack, the network's offerings, and in turn, its future. Combining the power of decentralized finance (DeFi) with Stellar's real-world utility will create something wholly differentiated in the world of blockchain.
Our journey moving forward is about making peoples' everyday financial lives undeniably better, so that they feel a difference as they build toward their futures. It is about bringing together every strength available--the tech, the ecosystem, the passion, and the expertise--in order to show up for the real world in more accessible, tangible ways.
Denelle Dixon | CEO & Executive Director, Stellar Development Foundation
Shaping Tomorrow's Finance
Stellar Development Foundation's Vision for Everyday Financial Services
Payments and remittances are the gateway to any financial system, making them the common denominators for every use case we aim to address. But the next step is to expand the adoption of payments and remittances and use the movement of that digital value to offer many of the same financial services available, such as savings, lending, credit, and other financial transactions, in a more accessible way.
Stellar is uniquely positioned to give more of the world access to solutions that can improve and enrich their financial lives without the friction and worry they experience today – redefining who has access to everyday financial services.
The years ahead will continue to be guided by people, the folks down the block and across the ocean, the next generation. We are setting out a vision that sets a better standard where not only payments, but everyday financial services, are accessible to all.
Guidance
North Stars to Guide Our Work
As we embark on making Stellar a standard for everyday financial services over the next five years, we will map our work to the following North Stars. In alignment with our North Stars, each year we will set a strategy coupled with measurable objectives to ensure the SDF constantly advances its mission.
Open participation, innovation, and governance are necessary for a future-proof and sustainable Stellar
SDF prioritizes the focus on everyday financial services in pursuit of our mission
A trustworthy technology stack advances adoption for everyday financial services
2024
Our Strategy
In 2024, we will build on the successes of 2023 and deliver on objectives focused on implementation, creativity, and expansion of the utility built on the network. Targeted objectives support each North Star — this is where the hard work and progress toward our vision happens
Open participation, innovation, and governance are necessary for a future-proof and sustainable Stellar.
Stellar needs to be important to a variety of stakeholders in a variety of geographies and industries for it to achieve the level of integration and use to make it a useful solution for a wide array of problems. The technology stack cannot be built in a manner that inadvertently excludes its use in certain regions. It also should not be built only for a single purpose - rather, it needs to be flexible enough to achieve a variety of goals. Open participation supports this type of engagement. Stellar must be easy, practical, and efficient for developers to build on for products that solve real problems for users or businesses worldwide. The involvement of many in the development and execution layer of Stellar future-proofs the network. Decentralization is a driver to this type of success, requiring that participants build, use, evangelize, and provide the care and feeding to Stellar that propels it forward. Stellar must be flexible enough to support what we know is valuable today AND what we and the ecosystem haven't yet conceived.
- Build a flourishing Soroban Ecosystem
- Establish a best-in-class developer experience
- Develop a roadmap for the future of Stellar Governance
SDF prioritizes the focus on everyday financial services in pursuit of our mission:
SDF must be opinionated about what it supports, even if Stellar is built as an innovation-agnostic platform. We want Stellar to be an open platform for developers to be creative and innovate in the areas that interest them. Still, we also want to be judicious about how we devote our resources as an organization toward increasing access to the global financial system. That means when it comes to supporting specific companies and use cases, we look at the ones building the everyday financial services products that can make today's system more accessible.
- Expand functionality & scalability to make Soroban a top tier smart contracts platform.
- Increase adoption of priority use cases through strategic go-to-market.
A trustworthy technology stack advances adoption for everyday financial services:
Blockchain offers innovation with new levels of transparency – and Stellar, which leverages reputation as part of its design, can be a true beacon of trust in the industry. As innovation evolves, SDF needs to ensure that Stellar lives up to the standard of trust that users want from their everyday financial services. We do that by setting standards, including payment standards, that take root because a diverse set of players adopts them. These standards must be useful and should put consumer protection first and create the type of interoperability that will make them successful.
To build a trustworthy tech stack, we will drive the following objectives:
- Prioritize safety for the Soroban ecosystem
- Implement a network monitoring strategy
- Develop a roadmap for long term scalability and sustainability of Stellar.
- Develop a prototype privacy solution
As every year, we will track progress in an open, transparent way through our quarterly reports.
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