Akropolis

At the time of analysis (May 2018), the team has not yet released an MVP, which is expected to be released in Q2-Q3 2018, according to the project’s roadmap. The absence of the MVP seriously jeopardizes the ability to assess the team’s competencies, the capabilities of the product, the level of product development and other crucial factors that investors in an ICO must consider before making an investment decision. Once the MVP is released, and the team’s progress is transparent, the level of risk of the project may go down

Pensions is a highly regulated industry in all countries around the world and the legal frameworks vary significantly from country to country. In addition to that, pensions is a rather conservative industry, and there may be yet unforeseen difficulties with the introduction of the platform in different markets, including difficulties with acceptance by society.

The team is not transparent on its website and some keys terms and information are not clear in the whitepaper too. E.g., start and end dates are not specified and bonuses (if any) are not mentioned. The terms of the presale stage were not specified, either. Also, the smart contract code on GitHub is not available for public review. The team says that the smart contract code  will be available soon on GitHub. At the time of analysis, we assessed this risk as Medium, although if the team discloses the respective contract code and updates its website regarding the key ICO terms before the launch of the public sale, these risks may have decreased at that point.

• Lack of justification of the need for the AKT token.
• Absence of market/competitor analysis (since there are no direct competitors, or key geographical market analysis with key indicators, etc.).
• The Roadmap, team and advisor composition, and ICO details are published on the website only, the whitepaper does not contain these details.
• Unclear token and project economics (e.g. fees are not specified, usability of AKT tokens, etc.).
• The forecast of marketing activities and plans for product promotion are not detailed enough to carry out an analysis and make the relevant conclusions, which is important for market acquisition.

Given that there is no MVP yet, all of the above significantly increase risks for investors. However, the team is going to release a General Paper as well as an updated whitepaper before the ICO is launched, which may answer some or all of the above questions.

The team has ambitious plans in terms of the complexity and deadlines of the project. They plan to release the MVP in Q2-Q3 2018 and the beta product by the end of 2018. Without the MVP it is hard to assess if those deadlines are feasible given that there are only 4 developers. In addition to that, several team members do not state the Akropolis project as their current employer which creates risks associated with part-time involvement. But when the ICO is finished the team may commit to full-time work and focus on development, which might cause the risk level to decrease. The Akropolis CEO stated in its official Telegram group that there are more team members still to be included in the development closer to the ICO.

The team has ambitious plans in terms of the complexity and deadlines of the project. They plan to release the MVP in Q2-Q3 2018 and the beta product by the end of 2018. Without the MVP it is hard to assess if those deadlines are feasible given that there are only 4 developers. In addition to that, several team members do not state the Akropolis project as their current employer which creates risks associated with part-time involvement. But when the ICO is finished the team may commit to full-time work and focus on development, which might cause the risk level to decrease. The Akropolis CEO stated in its official Telegram group that there are more team members still to be included in the development closer to the ICO.

The team estimates its marketing expenses in the amount of USD 2.5 million and legal/regulatory expenses in the amount of USD 3.1 million – both estimates assume that the hard cap of USD 25 million is reached. However, the absence of exact marketing plans and the legal complexity of pensions systems in different countries may prove these expenses to be underestimated.

There are no fundamental factors that indicate that token price will face significant pressure. However, failure to meet deadlines in the roadmap or difficulties/delays in product launch in different countries may lead to a decrease in token price.

There is some risk that key pension fund managers and/or asset managers will begin development of their own pension blockchain solution, once governments begin to accept the use of blockchain solutions, and if they have the resources to do that. If by that time Akropolis is not yet developed/implemented, the potential market for Akropolis becomes congested with possible new competitors.

The Akropolis project has a vastly experienced and knowledgeable advisors and partners. Their long-term advice would be very helpful for the Akropolis team to succeed, and their long-term involvement is usually guaranteed by the respective vesting conditions for advisors.