A deal on the Sonm open marketplace of resources is a contract between a customer and a supplier for the provision of a certain configuration of hardware for the use of the customer for a certain price and for a certain period of time if that has been determined.
Initially, Sonm realized the possibility of settling deals without specifying a period of time — spot deals. In spot deals, only the rental price of resources per hour (USD/h) is negotiated. Simultaneously, at any time, both the customer and the supplier have the right to end the deal without warning. This type of deal is convenient when it is important for the customer to get the minimum price and his or her task is one that can be easily transferred to other computing power, such as mining.
At the same time, there are many tasks (rendering, machine learning, scientific calculations, etc.) for which an unexpected interruption nullifies all the previously performed calculations. Therefore, customers with such tasks are interested in acquiring resources for a predetermined period of time.
Six months ago, forward deals (those with a fixed time) were implemented in manual mode in the Sonm marketplace: customers and suppliers manually created orders to buy and sell resources for a fixed amount of time. If two orders matched each other in all parameters (price, time, hardware configuration, etc.), a forward deal was automatically created.
Forward deals have a fixed duration (days, hours, minutes), guaranteed by the resource supplier. This means that the supplier undertakes measures to provide the computing power in accordance with the terms of the deal for the specified period of time and cannot break the contract earlier without incurring losses (being downgraded, being put on the black list, etc.). However, the customer has the right to end the deal at any time.
Now the conclusion of forward deals is available to the supplier in automatic mode. The supplier deploys the Sonm platform on his or her hardware, which includes the Sonm Optimus component, responsible for the automatic sale of computing resources.
Optimus evaluates the current buy orders on the Sonm marketplace, and if there is a profitable order with a suitable configuration, it creates a deal. To date, Optimus has only supported spot deals. Now it takes into account buy orders with a fixed time and thus can enter into forward deals. For convenience, in the Optimus settings, the supplier may limit the maximum duration of a forward deal in which he or she is willing to participate.
Customers of computing power interested in forward deals offer a higher price for resources than for similar resources in a spot deal, as the supplier must undertake additional obligations. Therefore, participation in fixed-time deals increases the average earnings of suppliers on the Sonm marketplace and does not currently require additional time costs.
The ability of all suppliers to automatically participate in forward deals increases the competition between them and allows customers to receive resources for the best price.
It is convenient to view buy and sell orders on the Sonm marketplace (Market -> Orders). You can view your deals by going to Market -> Deals.
How are deal payments made?
Payments for deals from the customer to the supplier (billing) are performed automatically in Sonm tokens (SNM) via the Sonm marketplace’s smart contract.
The billing period for spot deals is 1 hour and for forward deals 24 hours. The specified amount is withdrawn from the customer’s account at the beginning of each period, is frozen in the deal, and transferred to the supplier’s account at the end of the period.
Note that the prices of orders and deals on the Sonm marketplace are always indicated in USD. Payments are made in SNM tokens using the current exchange rate (Coinmarketcap). If the rate changes in the middle of the period billing operations, the supplier receives the payment in accordance with the new rate, and the amount the customer pays for the next period changes in accordance with the rate and adjusts for the previous period.
The customer should have enough SNM tokens in his or her account to pay for the next period of the deal before it starts. If there are not enough tokens to pay for the next billing period, the deal will end automatically.
The last payment is automatically made when the deal is ended. The supplier receives from the amount of tokens frozen in the deal from the last billing operation payment for the actual hours worked. The remaining funds, if the period is less than the standard, are returned to the customer’s account.
It’s possible to change the terms of the deal
After the creation of a spot or forward deal, both the customer and supplier have the opportunity to propose a change in the terms of the deal — price and/or duration (for a forward deal). To do so, a change request mechanism is used.
- The deal participant creates a change request in the Sonm Market or Sonm CLI with the offer of a new price and/or duration (for a forward deal).
- If the participant offers obviously better conditions (the customer offers a higher price, the supplier offers a lower price), then the terms of the deal change automatically from the next billing period.
- If the change request is not automatically accepted, the second party sees it in the deal information and manually decides to accept or reject it.
- If approved by the second party, the new conditions immediately take effect.
Support
Sonm technical support provides users with 24/7 support for working with the Sonm marketplace, launching tasks, and more. You will find the contacts of support services on our official website and documentation website.
Originally published at sonm.com on October 30, 2018.
