Key Participants

Trilobyte's lending model involves four key participants, each with distinct roles and responsibilities.

┌─────────────┐         ┌──────────────┐         ┌─────────────┐
│  Borrower   │◄────────│  Pool Manager │────────►│  Investor   │
│ (business)  │  loan   │ (underwriter) │  yield  │ (lender)    │
└─────────────┘         └──────────────┘         └─────────────┘
                              │
                     underwrites & monitors
                              │
                        ┌─────────────┐
                        │   Protocol  │
                        │  (Governor) │
                        └─────────────┘

Borrower

A business that needs working capital. The borrower receives the loan proceeds once the vault is fully funded and approved, and repays through incoming revenue over the loan term.

Key responsibilities:

• Apply for a loan through a Pool Manager

• Make periodic repayments on schedule

• Withdraw available funds from the cash pool

On-chain actions: receive_payment, withdraw_cash

Pool Manager

A professional underwriter who evaluates businesses, negotiates loan terms, and manages the vault throughout its lifecycle. Pool Managers are the bridge between borrowers and investors.

Key responsibilities:

• Perform due diligence on borrowers

• Structure loan terms (principal, rate, term, split ratio)

• Create vaults via the Factory contract

• Deposit collateral (skin in the game)

• Approve and disburse funded loans

• Monitor repayments and apply late fees when necessary

• Propose renegotiation when terms need adjustment

Requirements:

• Must be approved by the protocol's Operations Admin

• Must deposit collateral covering a percentage of each vault's principal

• Subject to credit limits that cap total outstanding principal

• Flagged as delinquent if a vault defaults — blocked from creating new vaults until cleared

On-chain actions: create_vault, deposit_collateral, approve_and_disburse, apply_late_fee, propose_renegotiation, approve_renegotiation, reject_renegotiation

Investor

Anyone who funds a loan and earns yield from the borrower's repayments. Investors deposit funds into a vault during its fundraising phase and receive SEP-41 debt tokens representing their share.

Key responsibilities:

• Evaluate available vaults and their terms

• Deposit funds during the RaisingFunds phase

• Claim yield from the EMI pool as repayments come in

• Monitor vault health and repayment status

In permissioned vaults, investors must be allowlisted by the Pool Manager before they can deposit.

On-chain actions: deposit, withdraw, claim_yield

Governor

The protocol administration that manages global settings and infrastructure. Governance actions are routed through a Timelock contract that enforces a delay on critical changes.

The Governor manages three roles:

Role	Who	Responsibilities
Admin	Governor / Timelock	Whitelist assets, set treasury, register the factory, upgrade contracts
Security Admin	Security team	Pause/unpause the protocol in emergencies
Operations Admin	Operations team	Approve/remove pool managers, set credit limits, clear delinquency, update global settings & protocol fee

On-chain actions: whitelist_asset, set_treasury_address, set_factory, pause, unpause, update_settings, set_protocol_fee, approve_pool_manager, remove_pool_manager, set_manager_credit_limit, clear_delinquency

Note: changing global settings and the protocol fee is an Operations Admin action and is not currently timelocked. See the Governance page.