Ripple’s Xpring Launches Developer Engagement Program 

Xpring, the investment arm and technological incubator of cryptocurrency giant Ripple Labs, has announced a new initiative that will help bring developers together. 

Dubbed “developer relations” (or DevRel), the new initiative will consist of a community page and a developers’ forum, which will essentially help to promote events, forums, and provide support and informational content to members as well, according to an official press release from the firm. 

Keeping a Vital Component Engaged 

The press release itself was penned by Ripple Labs’ Product Manager Warren Paul Anderson. In it, Anderson explained that the company has come to see the importance of developers to its entire process, and DevRel is its way of ensuring that these instrumental pieces have a voice. 

“At Xpring, product and engineering is the heart and soul of our team, and makes up over 80% of our headcount. Given that, we think of DevRel as the ears and mouth of Xpring. We also believe that we have two ears and one mouth for a reason – to listen more than we speak.”

Anderson explained that the creation of the initiative was the result of growing demand from developers across the blockchain space. With DevRel, Ripple Labs hopes to provide its developers with engaging and educative blockchain technology content, thus helping them to gain a better understanding of the space through videos, materials, demos, tutorials, and other educative media. 

Ripple Labs is Developing on Its Core Products 

It’s easy to see how and why Ripple Labs will want to ensure that its developers are properly engaged and educated. The company’s product has been a massive hit, with xRapid and xCurrent– its On-Demand Liquidity tools- seeing massive adoption across several countries and markets last year. 

The San Francisco-based firm was also able to ride on the success of these products to make significant alliances with other corporations, all the way to achieving a $10 billion valuation last month. If it wants to keep that momentum running, it will need to show that it has a viable and steady product. 

However, the move could also be in a bid to help improve on its digital asset. While Ripple Labs has seen sustained growth, XRP has tanked, leading to many believing that the firm has simply neglected its digital asset and focused on other aspects of its business. By educating developers, Ripple could be setting the stage for the development of a product that will have XRP at its core, thus providing an avenue for the asset to see a surge in adoption and price over time. 

Ripple has definitely shown signs that it won’t be moving ahead and leaving XRP behind. Earlier this week, the Japanese news medium Coinpost reported that the firm had partnered with SBI Holdings, a top financial services provider in the country, to provide SBI’s shareholders with as much as 8,000 yen ($73.72) in “benefits” next month. 

The move could see XRP adoption ramp up, essentially presenting the third most valuable digital asset as a viable investment once more after a rather weak 2019.