INTNCITY was originally ideated by founders William Riggs and Vipul Vyas as part of the research report Blockchain and Distributed Autonomous Community Ecosystems: Opportunities to Democratize Finance and Delivery of Transport, Housing, Urban Greening and Community Infrastructure which was funded by the Mineta Transportation Institute. During the project the team were drawn to create a forward-thinking technology company that used blockchain-based platforms to help build and finance local infrastructure with a mission to foster inclusive economic growth while promoting urban regeneration, enhancing transportation systems, and driving economic empowerment in local communities.

Following this the team joined with other partners with backgrounds from Polygon, Liquidum, Meta and Nuance joined the effort to focus on blockchain, crypto and AI applications to create sustainable solutions that address the challenges faced by urban neighborhoods engaging in numerous pilots. The first pilot project used the case study of planting trees in Oakland with the idea of accelerating the intensity of urban development at the local level and using blockchain to create more streamlined delivery of neighborhood infrastructure and services. The project explored the case of implementing the permitting, planting, and carbon-sequestration-tracking of 2,000 trees in City of Oakland, and deployed a blockchain-based platform for local Distributed Autonomous Organizations (DOAs) where neighbors can work together to build and finance infrastructure and provide better services that impact their daily lives.

The SFLUV project extended that work looking at currencies. SFLuv (sfluv.org) coin is a digital currency being deployed to provide economic ecosystem for citizen and business led investment in revitalizing local neighborhoods – building infrastructure; planting trees, cleaning streets & graffiti; creating a more beautiful and prosperous city.