Interview with Project Galaxy Founder: The Web3 Data Credential Market Could Reach $100 Billion
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Interview with Project Galaxy Founder: The Web3 Data Credential Market Could Reach $100 Billion
When your actions on-chain are permanently recorded, why wouldn't we believe that on-chain resumes could actually become a reality?
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsSource: BlockBeats
We've all heard that story—a graduate walks into an interview at a crypto investment firm, no resume in hand, just confidently sharing addresses from apps like CyberConnect and Mirror.
That's the most fascinating thing about Web3—it changes habits, redefines the cost of establishing trust. When your on-chain activity is permanently recorded, why wouldn't we believe that on-chain resumes can become real?
Project Galaxy offers a data network aiming to enrich every individual's Web3 resume. Simply put, Project Galaxy provides infrastructure enabling projects to issue verifiable credentials via NFTs to addresses that have completed specific actions, thereby forming data-backed credentials.
BlockBeats sat down with Charles, founder of Project Galaxy, to discuss Web3 applications, as well as his views on the industry, competitors, and the future.
The Beginning of a Web3 Credential Data Network
BlockBeats: Projects focused on collecting credentials seem rare—why are you bullish on this space?
Charles: Back in early 2021, we had an idea: what if we could help every project build its own infrastructure to use NFTs more effectively for community-building and product development? That was Galaxy’s first version. Initially, Project Galaxy served as an NFT-as-a-service platform, allowing projects to grow their user base by rewarding community members with NFTs.
However, we realized the core value wasn’t the NFT itself, but rather the action the user had taken to earn it. These NFTs thus became indirect proof—credentials—of what a user had done within a given project.
From there, we recognized that the data generated by users’ past participation across various projects would have immense future demand and value. We quickly shifted our focus toward building a credential data network.
BlockBeats: Galaxy recently raised $10 million—how do you plan to scale the credential collection space next?
Charles: Today, Galaxy focuses on building an open on-chain credential data network. Our NFT infrastructure exists to serve developers and users, helping them better utilize and interact with these on-chain credentials.
We now host over 500 distinct credential types, spanning more than 3 million blockchain addresses across various projects—an emerging on-chain credential data network. Our NFT infrastructure helps projects leverage this data to build stronger communities, increase user engagement, and drive growth.
Next, we’ll focus on several fronts: First, making the data network more open, so anyone can permissionlessly create credential datasets. Second, acting as an oracle and API provider, enabling developers to easily integrate this data into their own products. As I mentioned earlier, NFTs are just one of many data application modules we offer. In the future, we’ll develop additional modules. Beyond using Galaxy for community-building, projects might also build user tagging systems, distribute airdrops, launch new initiatives, run AMAs, conduct voting, organize offline events, or execute growth campaigns—all powered by our tools.
BlockBeats: So Galaxy is becoming more of a B2B platform?
Charles: Yes, Project Galaxy is fundamentally a B2B platform. Many of our investors have told us how useful it is—they’ve shared that every project in their portfolio ends up using Galaxy to improve both their community and product. That’s direct feedback we’ve received from investors themselves.
Galaxy’s Competitors
BlockBeats: If you had to describe Galaxy in a few words, what would they be?
Charles: It depends on the dimension. From a role perspective, we’re definitely “infrastructure”—whether in the DID, NFT, or data credential space, “infrastructure” best describes our positioning.
Second, “data credentials.” Everything we do revolves around data credentials because we believe demand for them in the Web3 world will be enormous. In Web2, data is fragmented and owned by individual corporations. Just like how people are discussing on-chain credit scores lately—in the traditional world, credit scores are determined by a few centralized rating agencies. But in Web3, much of the data is public on-chain, though disorganized. Few have built structured infrastructure like ours to capture and organize it. Perhaps in the future, each project could develop its own credit scoring system simply by plugging into data sources like Project Galaxy and building a risk model suited to their product.
Lastly, “empowerment” or “thrive” (we call it Thrive). Projects using Galaxy can enhance their products and communities. Or, if part of their user data becomes a credential on Galaxy, it can be reused elsewhere. Users benefit too—their credentials on Galaxy improve their experience when engaging with other projects.
BlockBeats: What do you think of POAP and similar credential badges?
Charles: I believe our NFT infrastructure is significantly more powerful than POAP. We support advanced features like NFT blind boxes, synthesis, paid issuance, community voting, merchandise redemption, content unlocking—and we offer better UX for both projects and users. Recently, Galaxy launched a lightweight NFT module called OAT (On-chain Achievement Token), developed in collaboration with Polygon and Filecoin’s NFT Storage. OAT is now deployed on Polygon and BSC. Users can claim tokens without paying gas fees, via QR code scanning or other methods, making it ideal for online and offline events. At ETH Denver this year, 14 offline event organizers used OAT.
BlockBeats: Besides POAP, are there other competitors? What are Galaxy’s advantages?
Charles: If you look at the full scope of Galaxy’s offerings combined, I don’t see a direct large-scale competitor yet. But if you break it down—for example, POAP excels in offline event credentialing, which makes it somewhat competitive with our OAT module.
There are also some vertical players in the trending “Learn-to-Earn” space, though their approaches differ significantly, so they’re not direct competitors. On the data side, I’m not aware of any Web3 data platform currently matching Galaxy’s scale in terms of data volume and user count. Every day, new projects add fresh credential data to our network. Across each of our modules, when measured individually, our performance metrics can already stand toe-to-toe with existing alternatives.
BlockBeats: Galaxy ID has been described as the “LinkedIn of on-chain.” Do you still see it that way?
Charles: Whether it’s Galaxy ID or our NFT infrastructure, the goal is to empower projects to better leverage our data network. Our clients frequently give us feedback and request new features, so we’ll keep expanding our application modules while making the underlying data network increasingly open.
Calling it the “Web3 LinkedIn” is a way to help users understand the concept, but we’re not trying to directly mirror Web2’s LinkedIn. Galaxy ID has surpassed one million registered wallet addresses this month, covering numerous EVM and Solana wallets along with associated Twitter accounts. Each Galaxy ID contains a record of the user’s past activities, achievements, and even offline event participation.
BlockBeats: How big do you expect this market to become?
Charles: Assuming Web3 truly takes off—and a significant percentage of the global population ends up owning crypto wallets—every wallet will generate on-chain data. Given that trajectory, growth in the Web3 credential and achievement data network space is inevitable, likely growing at an exponential rate.
I believe this market could reach $100–300 billion in the next 3–5 years—summing up the token valuations across this domain, hitting $100–300 billion is definitely within reach.
BlockBeats: Are there any founders or entrepreneurs you particularly admire right now?
Charles: I actually admire the founders of our competing projects—everyone building something similar to Galaxy. Even though they’re competitors, we all ultimately aim to accelerate user adoption in Web3. By competing, we push each other to innovate and improve.
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