Blockchain Episodes

I’m joined this week by two of the wonderful people I met at the Solana Breakpoint conference in Amsterdam last month: Amira Valliani, the Head of Policy at the Solana Foundation, and Nick Ducoff, the Head of Institutional Growth at the Solana Foundation.

Paul Smyth joins me as guest co-host this week, and he is a specialist executive recruiter and executive coach within the fintech industry.  As a founder of two startups, Paul has a unique view on the startup ecosystem.

This week I’m joined by guest co-host Mai Santamaria, the Head of the Financial Advisory Unit for the Department of Finance in Ireland. Mai and I riff on where crypto exchange Binance goes from here after being fined $4.3bn, with co-founder and CEO Changpeng Zao stepping down.  We also look at the new crypto-friendly Argentinian president, Javier Milei, and what he might do with dollarization and crypto adoption, and then finish up with a mind-opening counterpoint on Ethereum co-founder Vitalk Buterin’s new manifesto.

Pete Townsend introduces an insightful line-up of entrepreneurs and investors who share their thoughts on web3. Opinions are gathered around what aspects they hope to see web3 founders solve - their web3 wishlist - focusing on topics such as user experience, digital identity, decentralized finance, AI, regulatory issues, and real-world applications.

Sean Lee is the senior advisor at the Crypto Council for Innovation, which is a global alliance of crypto industry leaders advocating for responsible and healthy regulations in the digital asset industry.

Lou Kerner is the founder of the Crypto Oracle Collective, a decentralized web3 advisory firm, and also the DAO for Crypto Mondays, which is the largest crypto meetup in the world with active chapters in 54 cities.

Arry Yu is a 23+ year emerging technology industry veteran, serial founder and strategic operator with expertise in scaling businesses from "zero to one" with a consistent track record building high-performing teams.

Joining Pete as guest co-host this week is Pet Berisha from Sporting Crypto, the number one Web3 Sports business exploring the intersection alongside 3000+ subscribers from the biggest sports and crypto brands in the world.

We’ve got a special crossover episode this week courtesy of our friends at the Irish VC podcast, with a big shout-out to Finn Hatherell for producing the initial episode on the Irish VC podcast channel over the summer.  The Irish VC podcast is produced by BVP, an Ireland-based venture capital firm founded in 2004 by Elliott Griffin.

Eva Lawrence is the Head of EMEA for Figment, the leading provider of blockchain infrastructure, providing staking solutions for institutions.

Alejandro Gutierrez joins the show as guest co-host in this Money Talks segment. Alejandro is the CEO of Defactor Labs, providing all the required technological and financial tools for traditional companies to tap into alternative sources of financing using tokenized Real World Assets as collateral. Congratulations to Defactor Labs for taking home the gong at the inaugural National Fintech Awards in Ireland for ‘Best Crypto, Blockchain or Digital Asset Offering’.

After intersecting stories of meeting Vitalik Buterin and Bono, Pete Townsend and guest co-host Laura Walsh take a look at the recent SEC ruling in favor of Grayscale that many expect will open up the floodgates for the trillions of institutional capital currently on the sidelines of crypto.

Joining Pete this week are Liang Wu and Dan Herrera from Eleven26 Capital, an early-stage VC firm investing in diverse founders on the evolving Internet across web2 and web3. In this episode, we get into how Liang and Dan originally got together and stayed close through the years, their Evolving Internet thesis across web2 and web3, building a platform for investing through content creation and community into a flywheel, and a ‘so-what’ look at the intersection of web3 and AI.

Neal Peters is co-founder and CEO of JR Studio, a frictionless web3 gaming platform that gives game creators the superpowers to build, host, launch, manage, and grow their games and communities.

Federico Panisi is a co-founder and CEO of Loki.code, enabling simplified and intuitive co-creation of smart contracts with a collaborative web app for smart contract designers and developers.

Tatiana Botskina is the founder and CEO of Mintycode, a decentralized IP marketplace for software creators, bringing together software creators, software buyers, and software contributors. By building communities around software creators’ source code and enabling shared ownership, Mintycode helps software creators monetize their work and incentivize and reward contributors.

Terence Reilly is the co-founder and CEO of OLTA, a protocol for creators and studios to create dynamic media, pushing the boundaries from generative art into interactive art and story. OLTA brings this all to life through dynamic NFTs which enable collectors to determine the outcome of the artwork over time.

Javier Tamashiro is the co-founder and CEO of Ospree, a comprehensive anti-money laundering compliance solution for Virtual Asset Service Providers that seamlessly integrates customer onboarding, blockchain monitoring, and the Travel Rule.

Greg Hannam is the co-founder and CEO of Peerkat, a data analytics tool for marketers to help them understand their users, increase engagement and drive growth in their web3 strategies. In this episode, Greg chats with Pete Townsend about how his life experience drove him to the Peerkat vision, driving value for brands moving from web2 to web3, the evolution of non-fungible tokens (or NFTs) beyond profile pics, and a few life lessons along the way.

Deb Pratiher is the co-founder and CEO of Quest Labs, building infrastructure enabling organizations to leverage data in a privacy-preserving manner to unlock powerful user experiences.

Igor Khmel is the co-founder and CEO of SaveChain, the borderless banking app. SaveChain features a self-custody 'stablecoin-only' wallet with a banking interface for the global underbanked, with the option to open an FDIC-insured bank account for non-US residents. In short, SaveChain is Metamask meets Revolut.

Lee Gray is the co-founder and CEO of SonX, a community platform that allows superfans to subscribe to their favorite musicians via a monthly membership fee unlocking fan-only ticketing, exclusive audio content, and digital and physical collectibles.

Katerina Bohle Carbonell is the co-lead of TogetherCrew, one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator. Some web3 communities fall apart under pressure, others come together stronger. TogetherCrew exists to help build and grow communities by ensuring members and stakeholders create together.

Jesse Phillips is the co-founder and CEO of TrustWare, one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator.  Jesse and Pete Townsend dig into how Jesse got into crypto, the TrustWare vision he formed with co-founder Jonathan Frazier, adjusting to some of the crypto curveballs the world is throwing at TrustWare, and how life experiences are informing the building and scaling of TrustWare.