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Motivation
Likha recognizes a growing demand for Non-Fungible Token (NFT) driven utilities. As more multinational companies enter the metaverse, Philippine businesses are presented with a golden opportunity to ride the Web 3.0 wave and secure their own market share as early as possible. The rising market demand for NFTs is currently unfulfilled as technological solutions require high investment commitment from companies, asking them to set up costly internal development departments and training their marketing arm to accommodate the communication of digital assets. Likha aims to provide packaged NFT solutions for the Philippine art industry and the country’s corporate field, exposing our clients to successful digital asset adoption through NFTs that work for their consumer bases.
The Philippines is home to a large community of talented artists whose art is underappreciated due to a lack of market exposure and opportunity. In a country full of color and life, the barrier to entry for a Filipino artist’s work to reach market exposure is steep due to: a.) geographical limitations that place rural artists away from urban galleries and expos, b.) a reliance on being able to network with investors who might become potential buyers of their art. On the other hand, art investors are noted to be mostly affinity-driven (Sigg, 2013), which means that Filipino art buyers are likely to purchase art if they are visually attracted to it. The Filipino art scene is noted to be divided into two fragments: a primary market where artists can directly sell their works to galleries, dealers, and collectors through exhibits, expos, and a secondary market composed of all resales after the original purchase (Palanca-Tan, 2018).
Philippine Art has always been vibrant and full of life and yet, Filipino artists are underappreciated due to a lack of opportunities. Barriers to market exposure include geographical limitations that disconnect rural artists from urban art galleries and more specifically, the art industry’s reliance on a network of investors and collectors that are willing to buy the artwork. Moreso, based on research, art investors tend to be mostly-affinity driven, meaning Filipino art collectors are likely to invest in arts that they are visually attracted to.
Since the start of the pandemic, the rise of blockchain assets, like cryptocurrencies and non-fungible tokens (NFTs), has been steadily growing. Everyone around the globe was looking for other sources of income and investments while traditional businesses were on halt. In the Philippines, the surge in the interest in cryptocurrencies and NFTs can be observed in the rise in popularity of play-to-earn NFT games like Axie Infinity. On a survey done by Consensys last August 2021, the Philippines ranks #1 in the number of Monthly Active Users of Metamask Wallet globally. Aside from this, research from Finder.com reveals that the Philippines is leading in NFT adoption from the 20 countries surveyed. And out of the 1,507 Filipino internet users in that survey, 32% say they currently own an NFT while 9.5% express interest in acquiring some. These figures affirm that the Philippine market is gearing up towards the adoption of NFTs and adapting to the new wave of technology offered by Web 3.0 through digital assets.
Even with the number of Filipinos adopting blockchain tech, the Philippines have yet to have an authentic marketplace for NFTs. On the other hand, artists in the developed world are diving into new opportunities offered by this innovation. NFT marketplaces have connected artists and art galleries to a wide range of collectors not just locally but also around the world. This has led to projects like CyptoPunks where 10,000 generated images were directly bought by individual collectors resulting in a sale of over 2.1 billion USD. And with the rising popularity of NFTs in the Philippines comes a surging demand for the creation of an authentic Filipino NFT marketplace to lead the Philippine market’s onboarding and growth onto the technology.
The growing NFT markets in the developed world have increasingly connected artists and art galleries to a wide range of collectors, whether established or new. This has led to pixel projects like CryptoPunks where 10,000 randomly generated images were directly bought by individual collectors which lead to over 2.1billion USD in sales and traditional art-house backed mega-sales, such as when Christie’s hosted Mike Winkelmann’s (Beeple) Everydays: The First 5000 Days which sold for 69million USD. NFTs directly allow collectors to financially support artists who share their same passion for art. The Philippines still has no NFT market even though an NFT culture already exists within the country. From the popular game Axie Infinity being widely accepted to globally recognized artists participating in offshore NFT collections, there is a growing demand for the creation of a Filipino-driven NFT Market to lead the country’s onboarding and growth onto the technology.
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