Bitcoin Ordinals Marketplace Bioniq Launches—On Internet Computer

The Ordinals protocol—which enables the inscription of NFT-like assets on the Bitcoin blockchain—commanded the attention of the crypto world at the start of the year, and the space has continued to grow and evolve since. And here’s a new twist: The latest Bitcoin Ordinals marketplace isn’t even built on Bitcoin.

Bioniq, which is backed by Polychain Capital and officially opens Wednesday, is instead built on Internet Computer (ICP), the layer-1 blockchain developed by Dfinity that offers integrations with Bitcoin. In this case, Bioniq treats Internet Computer like a layer-2 scaling network of sorts, claiming that it offers various benefits over other Ordinals marketplaces.

It’s billed as the “world’s fastest” Ordinals marketplace, offers a built-in wallet with optional Google login via Web3Auth, and doesn’t charge network transaction or gas fees to traders.

It works via a token wrapping process on Internet Computer. Bitcoiners who want to use Bioniq can transfer their Bitcoin and Ordinals assets into the marketplace’s wallet. They can then choose to wrap the Ordinals asset by sending it to a specified Bitcoin wallet address for safekeeping, and then an identical NFT is generated on the Internet Computer network.

From there, assets can be traded on the speedier ICP network without gas or transaction fees. While there are extra steps involved to do so, Bioniq believes that this process is ultimately preferable to what most Ordinals marketplaces do, which is utilize partially signed Bitcoin transactions” (PSBTs) to handle transactions on the slower Bitcoin network.

“Even in high Bitcoin fee environments, everything that is wrapped can be transacted at the speed and cost of ICP rather than the speed and cost of Bitcoin, giving users a more reliable (faster and smoother) experience regardless of the fee spikes on Bitcoin,” Bioniq CEO and co-founder Bob Bodily told Decrypt.

Bioniq also offers functionality that it claims other Ordinals marketplaces lack, such as allowing for “easily adjustable” offers and enabling English auctions with a set reserve price.

Bodily and team also have big plans ahead for the marketplace, with ambitions to build a launchpad for newly minted collections, add a way for users to borrow crypto with their Ordinals assets held as collateral, and enable collection offers made with the intent of buying any asset in a particular desired project.