Moonriver is an EVM-compatible blockchain running as a parachain on the Kusama network. Compatibility with EVM allows Ethereum-based applications to be deployed on Moonriver.
The network provides developers with features such as deploying Solidity smart contracts, Web3-compatible APIs, oracle data, and Ethernet bridges. MOVR is the utility and governance token of the platform, which can be used for network governance, payment of transaction fees, rewards for providing liquidity and staking.

MOVR is Moonriver's utility and governance token with the following use cases:
Transaction Fees: Users can use MOVR to pay transaction fees and execute smart contracts.
Mortgage: Users can mortgage MOVR to become a validator or delegate, participate in the network consensus, and get MOVR rewards.
Governance: MOVR token holders are able to nominate council members and participate in voting on the network.
Liquidity mining: Provide liquidity for decentralized exchanges (DEX) built on Moonriver blockchains (such as Solarbeam) to earn part of the exchange's fees.

Moonriver consists of the following main parts:
Kusama: Kusama acts as a public testing environment (Canary network) before releasing the project on Polkadot. Moonriver is the Kusama ecosystem version of Moonbeam (GLMR) in the Polkadot ecosystem.
Parachains: Parachains are independent blockchains (Shards) that can be connected to Kusama.
Crowdfunding Loans: It is a method for projects to raise funds for a parachain slot on the Kusama network. Users temporarily lock their KSM in exchange for rewards from the project team, usually in the form of the project's native token.
Slot Auction: For a project to operate as a parachain on Kusama, a slot must be won in a parachain auction. Moonriver won the slot for the second slot auction through crowdfunding, thereby obtaining the Kusama parachain for a period of 48 weeks (from June 29, 2021 to May 13, 2022).

The project raised ~47K in KSM tokens from ~23.7K contributors in a Moonriver crowdfunding loan for the Kusama parachain slot auction.