The Polkadot-based Astar Network recently announced the first web3 and blockchain hackathon sponsored by the Japanese Toyota Motor Corporation. HAKUHODO KEY3 company, co-founded by Astar and HAKUHODO, one of Japan’s largest advertising companies, will host the web3 hackathon on February 25 this year. 

The Astar Foundation will sponsor the event with $75,000 and the web3 foundation with $25,000. According to a press release, the $100k will be used as a reward for winning projects chosen by Toyota, Astar Foundation, web3 Foundation, Alchemy, and HAKUHODO KEY3. 

How Toyota Can Improve Operations By Using The Polkadot Network

Sota Watanabe, CEO of Stake Technologies, made the announcement. Watanabe stated that in recent years, companies have been facing the challenge of increasing the workload on managers due to increased business decision-making and team member management. Therefore, The Astar Foundation and the Polkadot-based Astar Network decided to develop a DAO support tool for companies. 

DAO is the abbreviation for “Decentralized Autonomous Organization.”  By setting rules through smart contracts on the blockchain, the organizations and corporations like Toyota can be managed and operated “transparently.” 

In addition, Watanabe said that based on Astar Network convictions, if the company can manage projects as DAO, organizations like Toyota, in which team members can operate autonomously and with decision-making distributed, can reduce the manager’s workload and, at the same time, help with team members impact in the company’s growth. 

Toyota, the largest car company in the world in terms of sold cars, has over 330,00 employees across the globe. In the hackathon,  Astar is hunting for DAO tools to implement in the car manufacturer to improve its workflow and operations. 

Watanabe stated that they are looking for potential products, not only for Toyota but also for scaling to external parties. Sotanabe said:

(…) Needless to say, Toyota is the largest company in Japan and one of the world’s leading international companies. We are very excited to be hosting the web3 Hackathon on Astar with Toyota. During the event, we aim to develop the first PoC DAO tool for Toyota’s employees If a good tool is produced, Toyota employees will interact daily with products on Astar Network. Sometime in the future, I think we will see blockchain integrations in cars. Today, we are still in the exploratory stage, but very excited about the various possibilities.

This is Toyota’s first web3 hackathon and aims to support its vision of improving its operations; this hackathon will be the first step in the process. 

Overview Of The Use Of Blockchain By Astar Network

Astar aims to become the go-to blockchain project in Japan. Thus, they established a company called Startale Labs. Astar claims it is committed to further promoting web3 in the Asian country.

The government enterprises in Japan and web3 solutions are working with Astar to bring together a global platform to accelerate and create blockchain-based solutions for multiple use cases. Astar’s ecosystem has become Polkadot’s leading Parachain globally. 

Astar offers the flexibility for all Ethereum and WebAssembly tools, a binary instruction format for a stack-based virtual machine (WASM) for developers to start building their decentralized applications (dApps). Astar offers an Incubation Hub for teams of all backgrounds and focuses, used to accelerate growth on Polkadot and its experimental blockchain, the Kusama Network.