Technology startup Fedi launched the first production grade version of its Bitcoin super app – which shares the same name as the company – during a livestream on Tuesday morning.
The firm categorizes Fedi as a “super app” because it brings the functionality of multiple applications under the same roof. Specifically, the app enables financial transactions, secure chat, and social media on a single platform.
The super app concept is not new. Chinese technology giant Tencent’s WeChat is perhaps the most successful of such applications. Elon Musk, owner of X, indicated that one key reason for purchasing the platform formerly known as Twitter, was to eventually mold it into an “everything app.”
What may set Fedi apart from applications such as WeChat or some future iteration of X, is the use of bitcoin as a substrate for financial transactions, the implementation of several decentralized protocols, and the plan to eventually transition to open source code.
“We think it’s important for Bitcoin and the Bitcoin ecosystem to have a really high quality app that allows you to leverage the entire set of technologies in the Bitcoin space in one easy to use package,” said Fedi CEO and Co-founder Obi Nwosu in an interview with Unchained, before adding that Fedi is similar to “WeChat or Alipay or what Elon wants for X.com.”
Nwosu explained that Fedi will be “source available on day one,” meaning the code will be available for inspection by the public, but it will only become fully open source – where anyone can contribute to the code – several months down the road.
“In the following months, it will eventually become fully open source,” Nwosu said. “Up until now, you’ve got some really slick UX’s [user experiences] like Coinbase or Binance or something like that, these sorts of apps, or Cash App or Strike, but they are closed source.”
According to the company, the app will automatically transition to a full AGPL open source license (Affero General Public License) by January 2026. Fedi will be available on Android, iOS, and from the Fedi website.
Use Cases
The original vision for Fedi was to act as a community custody bitcoin application with a specific focus on the Global South. Community custody involves using existing trust networks to assist with safekeeping of one’s bitcoin.
According to a release shared with Unchained, “With even the most basic smartphone, users can join federations, designed to be decentralized and to work best when built from real-world relationships of trust – from families or villages to cooperatives, collectives, nonprofits, and all manner of other organizations.”
The company has indeed worked with nonprofits like Refunite which reunites refugees and displaced persons, The Kisaw Project which provides microloans to poor Sub-Saharan African farmers, and Save the Children which helps improve lives of children across the globe.
Fedi helps these organizations and communities use bitcoin as a medium of exchange which has the added benefit of increasing donation transparency and efficiency.
“We’ve learned an immense amount through these partnerships,” the release states. “They’ve been building with us, helping us reach underserved populations around the globe.”
The app is a for-profit venture despite its focus on nonprofits and less affluent markets. Nwosu said Fedi will charge 21 basis points whenever a user sends a transaction but receiving funds will be free – although other protocols may charge their own receiving fees.
“For receiving, there’s currently no fees for that,” Nwosu said, before explaining that “You could be charged fees by the Lightning Network potentially.”
Under the Hood
Fedi uses multiple protocols to enable the wide variety of functionality offered to users. The foundational protocol, after which the app and company are named, is Fedimint – an open source bitcoin custody protocol.
“It was originally designed to scale fiat cash in banks in 1983,” Nwosu explained. “David Chaum invented it.”
Chaum, a prominent computer scientist and cryptographer, used the concept of privacy-enhancing blind signatures to create e-cash, an early but centralized digital currency. Eric Sirion, Fedi’s other co-founder, later revisited Chaum’s work and incorporated multisignature functionality and the idea of federations – existing communities of Bitcoin users who trust one another – to create the Fedimint protocol underpinning the Fedi app.
“This is a system that has been around for a long time,” said Nwosu. “And we’re now providing a best-in-class user interface for it.”
The app also incorporates Lightning, which is Bitcoin’s second layer payment network for cheaper and faster transactions. Nwosu said Lightning “is the best form of low value, high speed transactions and connectivity to the rest of the Bitcoin ecosystem.”
Nostr, an open source and decentralized social media protocol, is used to help users navigate the social components of the Fedi app, according to Nwosu.
“We use Nostr for web of trust and discovery,” he said. “It’s a very powerful protocol.”
Decentralized protocol Matrix enables secure communication on Fedi. Mozilla’s Thunderbird email client is one of the more popular software applications currently using the same protocol.
“Fedimint has been worked on for nearly five years, Lightning is approaching ten years, Bitcoin is fifteen years, Matrix is over ten years. E-cash as a protocol is approaching 41 years,” Nwosu said. “And for the first time, all these technologies have become mature enough that you can build a user experience that brings it all together.”
