Blackbird, the loyalty platform of the restaurant, founded by Resy and Eater co-founder Ben Leventhal, shared Thursday that his Flynet Minnet is live, making restaurant payments on the chains.
Flynet is a Layer-3 blockchain based on the basic chain of Coinbase. Base, a Layer-2 network, enables users to transactions on top of Ethereum for faster and cheaper.
The team claims that having a Layer-3 benefits the restaurant industry because “by treating payments and loyalty programs completely on Flynet, Blackbird eliminates traditional intermediaries, reducing transaction costs and introducing a new model for rewarding both dinners and partners.”
Blackbird had previously released a payment platform, so that users can pay for their meals with $ fly, the native token of the platform that users could earn through the program loyalty program by dining in participating restaurants, or by buying it in the Blackbird -app using the USDC Stablecoin.
With Flynet Live, $ Fly will be used in the same way, but now restaurants can use the sign to also pay platform rates. Moreover, the team releases a new token, $ F2, to use for gas costs on the network.
The team said that they will air up to 13% of the $ F2 topping to early users and restaurants, with distribution, depending on certain activity statistics. The remaining 87% of $ F2 goes to “insiders, the treasury, and we have six more seasons after that we will allocate tokens to the participants,” Leventhal Coindesk said in an interview.
According to the team, Blackbird has $ 85 million in financing with backers from Andreessen Horowitz (A16Z), Coinbase, Spark Capital and American Express. In 2023, A16Z raised more than $ 24 million for the platform in a series A round.
Blackbird is currently available in New York, San Francisco and Charleston, and let Diner’s rewards earn at some of their favorite restaurants. Leventhal told Coindesk that there are around 500 restaurants as part of their loyalty program.
“What we think we can do is build something where transactions become much more cost -effective, and the levers that have to attract and retain restaurants will become enormous,” Leventhal Coindesk told how he sees the restaurant industry and blockchain intersection. “And those two things, more than whatever, is the reason why we build in the chain.”
Read more: Blackbird, Web3 Startup from Resy Co-founder, wants dinners to pay for meals in Crypto