Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have gained worldwide appreciation and attention, especially in the world of art and gaming. However, this innovation has far wider applications of notice than entertainment and art. One of the budding applications of NFTs is paying for subscriptions in ways never imagined before, saving the subscriber hundreds of dollars a year in the process.
Joining us today is Revuto CEO, Vedran Vukman to discuss how his company Revuto, a Croatian-based subscription management app is leveraging the power of NFTs to help subscribers pay, actively manage, and earn from their subscription periods.
Hello Vedran, thank you for joining us. Please tell us about yourself, what is Revuto, and how the app came to be?
My name is Vedran, and I’m the CEO and co-founder of Revuto, a crypto-powered mobile app to help people actively manage their subscriptions and pay for their subscriptions [and get discounts] by using Revuto debit cards. The goal is to offer users a single place for all their subscriptions, protection against unwanted subscription charges (including free-trial traps), privacy, and, most importantly, to save and earn money on their subscriptions.
The idea for the project came from my personal experience. While running my previous company, I noticed that I was paying almost all tools and services on a monthly subscription basis while losing track of how much, when, to whom, and with what I was paying for. I put everything on the paper, all those cards I pre-authorized with all kinds of services, and the first thing I noticed was that I was paying for things I wasn’t using anymore. Also, I was shocked by how much I was paying monthly for all those subscriptions. Amazed by my findings, I asked others if they had the same problem, and interestingly, almost everybody confirmed. Later, I asked our CTO, who was at the time an employee of Intuit, probably the biggest fintech company in the world, if he could get me the data from Quickbooks, Mint, Quicken etc. about peoples’ spending and I was amazed by the numbers. Immediately, we started to talk about building the product to solve a big problem in the market, growing 100% year over year.
Over the past year, we have seen many startups flourish in other areas of blockchain and crypto by choosing to build decentralized finance (DeFi) products, non-fungible token (NFT) markets, and Metaverses. But Revuto has selected a new approach, launching a subscription management service. What would you say is the unique selling point of your company? What makes it different from other blockchains/crypto businesses?
In my opinion, blockchain as a technology that offers amazing new opportunities when transferring funds and putting money to work for you should work as nothing more than an underlying technology for businesses that already exist. In short, if we aim at mass crypto adoption, the user experience needs to be very simple and solve real-world problems. Many crypto projects focus on overcomplicated setups that require significant knowledge about the technology to be used properly. In that regard, Revuto is a pretty straightforward app supporting crypto to help people solve obvious problems.
Apart from managing their subscriptions, what other utilities and benefits can users enjoy on Revuto app?
As already said, our setups supporting crypto, help people save and earn money on their subscriptions. For instance, by combining NFTs with our virtual debit cards, which people can use to subscribe to their services, we offer users a unique opportunity to monetize unused subscription periods. Why is that important? When subscribing directly with merchants, in most cases, users can choose between a monthly subscription and a 12 or 24-month subscription to save money. In reality, paying for a longer subscription period is good for service providers but bad for users because more than 50% of users lose money on subscriptions they already paid for but don’t use.
With Revuto and Subscription NFTs, users will be able to subscribe to any service for any subscription period (5, 10, 15… months, free choice), get a discount from Revuto to pay for that period (buy the NFT) and get a virtual debit card to subscribe with that service which Revuto will be topping up with the funds necessary to pay for that subscription every month until the prepaid subscription period ends. The beauty of the setup lies in the fact that if the user decides not to use the subscription anymore and while there’s still a subscription period left, he can send or sell his unused subscription period (the NFT) to someone else. In that case, the buyer and new NFT owner will get the virtual debit card from Revuto to subscribe to the same service, and Revuto will be topping up his card to pay for that subscription every month until there’s a subscription period left. This allows one user to monetize their unused subscription periods, others can buy subscriptions from them for less. Basically, we found a great utility for the tech where we use NFTs as proof of pre-payment for specific services and virtual debit cards to allow users to pay for those subscriptions. The setup may seem complicated, but it’s simple and it works.
Revuto is launching the REVUlution NFT project as one of the Subscription NFTs. Could you tell us more about the project and its benefits to users?
Revolution NFTs for free Netflix or Spotify for life is nothing more than an introduction to the setup I described above and in which we use NFTs and virtual debit cards to allow users to subscribe with their services. We call them Revulution NFTs because we plan to use the setup to revolutionize the subscription economy and how people pay for their subscriptions. Still, Revolution NFTs are a bit special because with them we offer our users the unique opportunity to get a free subscription to Netflix or Spotify for life. Users holding the Revulution NFT in the Revuto app will get a virtual debit card to subscribe to Netflix or Spotify but in this case, Revuto will be topping up the users' virtual debit card to pay for Netflix or Spotify monthly subscription as long as there’s Revulution NFT in his Revuto wallet. Again, if the user, for any reason, decides not to use his Netflix or Spotify anymore, he can send or sell that NFT to another user so he can enjoy the same.
As you’ve explained, the REVUlution NFTs will be launching a campaign to give a limited number of NFT holders lifetime subscriptions to Netflix and Spotify. Could you explain how Revuto will do this and the benefits users will have from this campaign?
We’re offering a limited number of 10K Revulution NFTs for Netflix and Spotify. This is a one-time offer, and Revuto won't be offering the same again. Our business model is not to offer lifetime subscriptions but to allow users to prepay specific subscriptions for the period of their choice (by buying the NFT), which they can later use with Revuto to get a virtual debit card and use it to subscribe to that service for a specific period.
Besides the opportunity for the users to save money on their subscriptions to Netflix or Spotify, there’s an upside for Revuto as well because we will use the campaign and NFTs to acquire new users. It’s a great user acquisition model because those NFTs are transferable, and tradable while keeping a lifetime value to their holders. Even better, assuming the price of Netflix or Spotify will go up with time, the value of those NFTs should go up as well. When talking about benefits for the user only, besides a free subscription to Netflix or Spotify, every NFT owner will get 4% cashback in REVU on every payment made with a virtual debit card to Netflix or Spotify, the chance to stake (lock) their NFTs to get rewards in REVU tokes, to participate in special lotteries and more.
Will the free lifetime Spotify and Netflix subscriptions be available to all countries with the service?
Regardless of where they’re coming from, everybody can purchase NFTs, hold them to get rewards or trade them. Still, for now, only UK and EU citizens can use them to pay for their Netflix or Spotify because only those will be able to get virtual debit cards. At the moment, Revuto is compliant with the card issuer (Railsbank/Payrnet) to issue debit cards to EU and UK citizens. The plan is to go worldwide with the service, but we’ll be opening region by region.
While the NFTs are currently available on Cardano blockchain’s CNFT and NMKR marketplaces and Ethereum’s Opensea, is there a plan to add interoperability features to other blockchains (such as Solana) and external NFT marketplaces in the future?
Revolution NFTs are available for purchase with crypto via CNFT marketplace and NMKR on Cardano and via OpenSea marketplace on Ethereum. Still, those who buy erc20 NFTs will have to exchange them for Cardano NFTs before using them with the Revuto app. We offer an easy exchange procedure to all erc20 Revulution NFT holders. As our goal is always to offer a simple user experience, especially to those who were not involved with the crypto in the past, on our webpage revuto.com/nft there’s a webshop where anybody can easily buy their Revulution NFTs with their debit or credit cards.
What are your thoughts on the current crypto market trends?
I’m convinced that there’s a very bright future for crypto, but mass adoption won’t happen overnight. Again, in my opinion, crypto enthusiasts, early adopters, and most importantly, developers need to simplify the user experience in order to onboard more people to use crypto, especially Defi. On the other hand, I’m not happy with the setups, which are not working as they should but exist only because they can, because there’s no regulation. I’m not going to go further into this, but my stand on it is clear. I’ll wrap it up with the fact that Revuto is a regulated business holding an e-money license established in the Republic of Lithuania.
Thank you for your time, Vedran. Any closing comments for your customers and followers?
I appreciate the opportunity to present Revuto to your followers. I’d advise them to check revuto.com to secure their Revulution NFTs, download the Revuto app, and become part of an amazing Revutonian community. Only together can we save and earn on subscriptions we’re all already paying for.
Vedran Vukman is the CEO and co-founder of Revuto, a subscription management app that has raised over $10 million in funding and has over 150,000 customers. Vedran previously worked as an advisor to eVAT, a Germany-based automated VAT compliance service for e-commerce and led Vyoocam, a simple to use, wearable video conferencing device, as its CEO.
