Benzinga | Aug 9, 2021 01:02PM EDT

WISeKey Joins Forces With Menthol Protocol To Make Its WISe.Art NFT Platform Climate-Positive

August 9, 2021 - WISeKey International Holding Ltd (NASDAQ:WKEY, SIX: WIHN))))), a leading cyber security, IoT, and AI platform company, today announced that is collaborating with Menthol Protocol, the first decentralized automated sustainability protocol that automatically power users of dApp transactions with verified renewable energy and carbon credits, to make WISe.Art NFT platform climate-positive.

WISe.Art is the first NFT platform which due to its proprietary NFT technology, is safe (KYC & Cybersecurity), green (Carbon neutral & Menthol Protocol), smart, and provides a unique "melting pot" for traditional & crypto art, luxury good and collectible lovers.

WISeKey is a pioneer in the area of cybersecurity. For more than two decades, WISeKey has been providing its clients with object authenticity and anticounterfeiting offerings, a technology that has been applied to art, luxury goods, and collectibles, through a holistic approach in collaboration with strategic partners from the decentralized space. The marketplaces for these services will provide a spectrum of premium and standard offerings.

Against this background, WISeKey is launching its own NFT platform for creating, marketing and selling NFTs as digital twins for high end luxury collectibles and artwork. The intention is to take the 'hot air' out of NFTs and by linking the NFTs to actual physical art or collectibles and by attaching digital rights and creating true value for collectors, artists and brands.

"However, one major challenge of 2021 remains the climate crisis, which has to be tackled in different spheres, in the physical but also in the digital world, by reaching to the transaction world of the web3, namely the Blockchain, sphere," said Carlos Moreira, CEO of WISeKey.

Therefore, the collaboration with Menthol Protocol is essential to ensuring WISe.Art's NFT platform is climate-positive. Mohamed Hassan, CTO of Blok-Z, a green-tech blockchain startup, and Amir Sultan Malik Awan, CEO of Rocket Blockchain, a company focused on tech, industry and sustainability, have been building solutions to make it easy for enterprises and crypto to be climate positive. They are some of the leaders behind Menthol Protocol's vision and have been advisors to WISeKey.

"We are excited to exchange values, strategies, and business visions with WISeKey's team and working closely with cyber-security pioneer, Carlos Moreira and eminent AI authority, Chris Boos, while implementing innovative, interdisciplinary solutions in a growing and emerging space," said Amir Awan.

"WISe.Art team is just as passionate with provenance and sustainability as we are, which makes them an ideal partner for Menthol Protocol. Artists, curators, and users will be able to create and trade NFTs that are provably authentic and have a positive impact on the world. Together, we are planting the seeds of a sustainability-focused ecosystem interested in decarbonizing user activities, dApps and entire blockchains," said Mohamed Hassan.

In addition to using Menthol Protocol to sustainably power their on-chain operations, WISe.Art will issue the TrustECoin (TEC). Of note, a fixed percentage of revenues generated by each NFT transaction will be allocated and donated to fund impactful sustainability projects. WISeKey believes it is not only important to quickly take action but also to be a leader in reversing climate change and nurturing ecosystems around the world.

In this vein, also WISe.Art partners with companies such as CO2free.com, which plans to offer and supply CO2 certificates from personal CO2 savings on a Blockchain, benefiting the ecosystem of CO2 on-chain decarbonization. Therefore, WISe.Art is supporting projects, which allow the tokenization of CO2 savings on an individual level targeting human users of digital products, to capture respective CO2 savings and aggregate, measure, incentivize and ultimately monetize positive CO2 behavior.

"At CO2free, we measure the personal CO2 footprint with the smartphone in a scientifically sound manner by real-time-data. We also reward our app users for their active contribution to climate protection," said CO2free.com Managing Director, Thomas Steins. "With WISe.Art and Menthol Protocol we have the perfect partners for our green blockchain to tokenize the CO2 savings of every user and rewards their global impact," said CO2free.com founder, Alexander Emming.