Maltese tech and blockchain entrepreneur Max Thake celebrated the live launch of peaq, a global, decentralised network built to power applications in industries such as mobility, energy, and telecommunications, by reflecting on the efforts and sacrifices he and his co-founders have made to get to this stage.

“They say life happens in seven-year cycles,” he wrote in a missive posted to LinkedIn. “Leo [Dorlöchter], Till [Wendler], and I began this journey on a Berlin rooftop in the summer of 2017. We look and sound very different to the people who set peaq in motion – but our conviction hasn’t wavered.”

Mr Thake had dropped out of MCAST and moved to the German capital to follow his conviction “that this technology” – referring to blockchain – “can positively reshape humanity’s most critical industries and power a new age of progress and prosperity. And consequently, a conviction that the fruit worth picking in this industry is further up the tree.”

That conviction eventually became a dream, and later a vision that “inspired a team and an ecosystem, and together we built and we built – no matter what was thrown at us.”

He compared the launch of peaq to that of a rocket, saying that “a lot like launching a rocket, a huge amount of work goes into just getting a project like this ready to launch and into the air.

“We threw every day of our 20s into building this rocket – and we’ve never been more committed to making sure this rocket gets to its destination.”

The launch of peaq, which has raised over €20 million in seed and pre-launch funding rounds, means that around 2 million devices, vehicles, and machines providing services to people via more than 50 blockchain-based apps in 21 industries will now prepare to go onchain.

“From decentralised energy grids, to Google Maps alternatives, to citizen-led weather forecasting, electric vehicle charging, tokenized autonomous robots – and so much more.

“This is, as far as we’re aware, the most meaningful traction a layer-1 blockchain has ever had on launch day.”

peaq's launch day, continued Mr Thake, marks “the beginning of what we call the Machine Economy – a network-economy built and owned by the people and the machines that use it.”

He described peaq as “the global computer powering the Machine Economy – a decentralised operating system with built-in governance mechanisms, which works to incentivise the best in humans and machines” – with the peaq token acting as “the lifeblood of the Machine Economy.”

Delving deeper into the impact of the technology in the medium term, the tech founder forecast that in 10 years, “it will be normal for people to form local and global collectives that do the work of today’s largest companies better, faster, and cheaper – and for the good of all, not just the privileged few.”

He concluded by laying out the lofty aspirations he holds for the future, saying that peaq will help in the transition of economic structures “from a zero-sum game to a positive-sum, regenerative economy” that would “nullify the threat of mass job automation” and “enable global access to the Age of Abundance.”

peaq would also “replace reliance on centralised powers with reliance on community” and assist in the creation of “systems to govern, live and prosper alongside Sovereign Machines.”

Mr Thake said that the technology represents “nothing short of a global infrastructure revolution” by “empowering communities to build, own, and earn from their own value-generating apps and networks.”

“At a time where faith in institutions is at an all time low, we think of peaq as an opportunity to learn to trust each other again.”