With Telegram now boasting greater than a billion customers globally, few blockchain ecosystems have a clearer distribution benefit than TON. Initially conceived as Telegram’s native blockchain, TON has quietly advanced into one of the bold makes an attempt to embed Web3 infrastructure instantly right into a mainstream shopper platform.
In an interview with Cryptonews, Max Crown, President and CEO of the TON Basis, explains why TON has succeeded the place others have struggled — and the way its consumer-first design, social NFTs and institutional traction are shaping its subsequent part of progress.
Constructed for Scale From Day One
Based on Crown, TON’s core benefit lies in its authentic design philosophy.
“Most blockchains have been constructed for crypto-native experimentation first and solely later tried to retrofit themselves into shopper platforms,” he mentioned. “TON took the alternative method.”
From its inception, TON was engineered for internet-scale utilization — prioritising quick finality, low latency and predictable prices. That technical basis, Crown argues, formed the ecosystem’s tradition.
“The developer tradition optimised for usability and velocity moderately than complexity or monetary engineering,” he mentioned. “Functions on TON really feel a lot nearer to mainstream cell apps than conventional Web3 merchandise — intuitive, social and prompt.”
Crucially, that alignment extends past infrastructure. TON’s blockchain, developer group, utility layer and Telegram integration all pull in the identical route, turning distribution right into a native characteristic moderately than a advertising problem.
“What makes Telegram so distinctive is that it’s open, permissionless and a launchpad to lots of digital economies and digital creation.”
With TON, now we have a Web3 basis to construct on and Web2 distribution that reaches billions.
Crypto used to really feel difficult.
Now it feels… pic.twitter.com/fdh4qQCzS0— Max Crown (@mcrown) October 22, 2025
“Different ecosystems tried to show shopper apps into Web3 entrance ends after the very fact,” Crown mentioned. “TON succeeded as a result of it was constructed particularly to change into the Web3 infrastructure inside a shopper app.”
Rethinking Crypto Onboarding
For a lot of the business, onboarding stays Web3’s Achilles’ heel. Wallets, seed phrases and fuel charges proceed to alienate mainstream customers — an issue TON got down to eradicate.
“Most Web3 onboarding breaks down as a result of it asks customers to grasp crypto earlier than they expertise worth,” Crown mentioned. “TON flips that mannequin fully.”
With TON embedded inside Telegram, consumer acquisition occurs organically. Discovery begins in chats, communities or mini-apps, permitting customers to work together with video games, digital presents or funds with a single faucet.
In observe, “zero-friction” onboarding means two issues: a deeply built-in pockets expertise and abstraction of crypto’s most intimidating mechanics.
“The TON pockets lives inside Telegram,” Crown explains. “Funds, property and interactions really feel like options of the app — not separate crypto workflows.”
Consequently, onboarding turns into virtually invisible. “In lots of circumstances, customers don’t even realise they’ve onboarded to crypto in any respect,” he mentioned. “They’re simply chatting, gifting or paying.”
NFTs as Social Objects, Not Speculative Belongings
TON’s Telegram Presents-to-NFT characteristic — which noticed a reported $12 million sell-out tied to Snoop Dogg — marked a turning level in how NFTs may operate at scale.
For Crown, the importance lies in reframing NFTs away from hypothesis.
“On TON, NFTs evolve as social and cultural objects first — and solely secondarily as monetary devices,” he mentioned.
Somewhat than present in remoted marketplaces, NFTs on TON dwell inside conversations, fandoms and creator economies. They operate as presents, badges and entry keys — nearer to digital trend or emojis than speculative collectibles.
“Financialisation doesn’t disappear,” Crown mentioned. “Nevertheless it turns into a layer on prime of that means and utility, not the place to begin.” That shift, he believes, is vital to mainstream adoption.
Why Establishments Are Paying Consideration
TON’s shopper traction is more and more mirrored by institutional curiosity. Greater than $400 million in Toncoin has reportedly been bought by institutional traders this yr.
Crown attributes this to a mixture of community maturity, seen utilization and bettering infrastructure.
“TON immediately seems to be very totally different from even a yr in the past,” he mentioned. “The community is steady at scale, and the encompassing ecosystem — custody, compliance, liquidity — is lastly institutional-grade.”
Telegram’s embedded distribution mannequin can be a differentiator. “TON isn’t attempting to accumulate customers the arduous method,” Crown mentioned. “It’s embedded in a platform folks already use every single day. That asymmetry issues to long-term capital.”
Institutional demand, nonetheless, hasn’t altered TON’s route.
“We’re not optimising for establishments on the expense of customers,” he mentioned. “What it does affect is self-discipline — greater requirements round safety, resilience and transparency.”
Navigating U.S. Growth and Regulation
As TON expands its footprint within the U.S., regulatory complexity stays a problem. Crown says the surroundings is bettering, even when uncertainty persists.
“The U.S. is materially extra navigable than it was a yr in the past,” he mentioned. “The principles of the street have gotten extra predictable.”
Crown is cautious to differentiate between protocol and application-level regulation.
“TON is a decentralised blockchain — it’s a know-how layer, not a regulated monetary middleman,” he mentioned.
To assist compliant exercise, TON works with blockchain intelligence companies comparable to TRM Labs, Elliptic and Chainalysis, enabling builders to fulfill sanctions screening and transaction monitoring necessities the place crucial.
“The objective is to maintain the bottom layer open and impartial,” Crown mentioned, “whereas enabling compliant merchandise on the utility layer.”
A Management Shift Targeted on Execution
Crown’s current appointment as each President and CEO displays TON’s transition right into a extra operationally rigorous part. “The problem wasn’t imaginative and prescient — it was coordination,” he mentioned.
Combining the roles tightens decision-making and aligns technique with execution because the ecosystem scales. “We’re coming into a part the place fundamentals matter greater than experimentation for its personal sake,” Crown mentioned, pointing to reliability at scale, developer expertise and seamless onboarding as priorities.
Classes From MoonPay
Earlier than TON, Crown co-founded MoonPay, a consumer-facing crypto funds platform — an expertise that continues to form his method.
“The largest lesson is that distribution and frictionless onboarding matter greater than virtually anything,” he mentioned.
At MoonPay, success got here from abstracting complexity and emulating acquainted shopper experiences. “Customers didn’t need to find out how crypto labored — they only wished it to work,” Crown mentioned.
That precept now underpins TON’s technique: make the blockchain layer invisible.
“If the expertise feels intuitive and dependable, adoption follows.”
Competing With Ethereum and Solana
As different Layer-1s pursue mass adoption, Crown is obvious about TON’s “unfair benefit”.
“TON is the one main chain with a direct path right into a mainstream product folks open every single day: Telegram,” he mentioned.
Whereas Ethereum excels in composability and Solana in efficiency, TON’s worth proposition is distribution. “If you would like the quickest path from ‘I shipped’ to ‘hundreds of thousands of actual customers,’ TON is in a class of its personal,” Crown mentioned.
With improved developer tooling and plug-and-play primitives on the roadmap, TON is positioning itself as the best bridge from Web2 to Web3.
“The chance is easy,” Crown mentioned. “Telegram has a world, Net-willing viewers. TON is the place the following viral shopper crypto product can really feel like a traditional app — and scale like one.”
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