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MoneyNeverSleeps

MoneyNeverSleeps

By Pete Townsend

A weekly podcast that looks inside the minds of entrepreneurs and at the crossover of startups, enterprise, finance, technology and life as we know it, hosted by early-stage startup investor Pete Townsend.
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109: Firestarter | Brian Mac Mahon and Expert DOJO

MoneyNeverSleepsOct 30, 2020

00:00
39:30
253: CBDC Adoption | Who's Ahead of the Game? | Joaquim Matinero Tor

253: CBDC Adoption | Who's Ahead of the Game? | Joaquim Matinero Tor

Joaquim Matinero Tor joins the show this week as guest co-host as we look at the likely paths to the adoption of CBDCs (or Central Bank Digital Currencies) in the different countries around the world making progress with these digital versions of fiat currencies.  

Joaquim Matinero Tor, or just “Quim” as he’s known to friends, is a lawyer with expertise in blockchain, digital assets, and web3 and a depth of experience in venture capital, mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, derivatives and securities markets in general. Quim is a counsel at Ceca Magan in Barcelona, he serves as a lecturer at several universities and business schools, and he’s lent his expertise to CBDC projects for the European Union, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Singapore, the United Nations, and the World Bank.

In this episode, Quim helps me to understand the view of the general public towards CDBCs around the world, and sort through some of my lighthearted distaste for CBDCs. We also look at what’s happening with CBDCs in Asia, and how the country-by-country consumer trends with fintech and smartphones may influence CBDC adoption in those markets.

LINKS:

Connect with Joaquim Matinero on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joaquim-matinero-tor/

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Mar 22, 202436:50
252: Meet the Techstars Web3 Class of 2024

252: Meet the Techstars Web3 Class of 2024

This episode features an introduction to the 12 founding teams that form the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2024, with each of their founder/CEOs giving you a quick look inside what they're building.


Meet the companies! 

Artizen - Match-funding platform for breakthroughs in human creativity. 

Founder locations:  USA / UK | Featured Founder/CEO:  Rene Pinnell

The Colony -  Shaping the future of collectibles through blockchain technology.

Founder locations: USA / Canada | Featured Founder/CEO: Andrea Miele

Ember AI - AI DeFi companion that understands what you want and helps you do it securely, without new apps or hardware.

Founder locations: USA / Colombia  | Featured Founder/CEO: Tom Daniel

FairAI - Fueling democratized open-source AI through a decentralized marketplace with digital property rights. 

Founder locations:  Portugal / USA | Featured Founder/CEO: Tiago Ferreira

FileMarket - Multichain data tokenization protocol for storage and P2P digital goods trading.

Founder location: Hong Kong  | Featured Founder/CEO: Ilya Orlov

GenoBank - Ensuring the privacy and data ownership of your genetic information.

Founder location: USA | Featured Founder/CEO: Daniel Uribe

Lantern Finance - Custodial staking and lending services for the everyday investor.

Founder location: USA  | Featured Founder/CEO: Jung-Won Kim

Millicent -  The open smart contract platform for compliant real-world DeFi.

Founder locations:  UK / USA | Featured Founder/CEO: Kene Ezeji-Okoye

PawPass - Digital identification for animals.

Founder location: UK | Featured Founder/CEO: Julia Kemp

ProofSpace - No-code platform for reusable identity. 

Founder location:  UK | Featured Founder/CEO: Nick Mason

SportsyncTech - Empowering amateur sports organizations and athletes with innovative, data-driven solutions.

Founder locations:  France / USA  | Featured Founder/CEO: Fabien Arneodo 

Savvy - Interest-free lending protocol with overcollateralized deposits and self repaying loans.

Founder location:  USA  | Featured Founder/CEO: Roman Giler


LINKS:

Learn more about the Techstars Web3 Class of 2024:

https://www.techstars.com/accelerators/web3

Leave a review and subscribe on 

-Apple Podcasts:  https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/id1455819294

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Mar 15, 202411:12
251: Money Talks with Laura Walsh | Farcaster, Digital Identity and Decentralized Social Media
Mar 08, 202446:06
250: The World is Yours | Brian Zwerner, W3 Studio & Beyond the Game Network | Investing in Diverse Founders, Sports and Web3

250: The World is Yours | Brian Zwerner, W3 Studio & Beyond the Game Network | Investing in Diverse Founders, Sports and Web3

Brian Zwerner is the President and Founder of W3 Studio, and a VC and Founder of Beyond the Game Network.  As the President and Founder of W3 Studio, a 501c3 non-profit venture studio, Brian and his team help diverse founders in Atlanta build startups in web3. W3 Studio partners with corporations and provides grants to startups to fund the launch of their first products.

With his role as a VC and Founder at Beyond The Game Network, Brian teams up with a venture group of athletes that invest in Seed to Series B consumer startups in sports, media, web3, and fitness.

Brian Zwerner was previously the founder of Sportal, a startup in the sports industry. He managed the growth of Aquina Health through a Series A capital raise. He has invested in or held senior roles with several companies and funds and previously spent 20 years in investment banking roles in the US and overseas. 

In this episode, Brian and I riff on what led him to scratch his entrepreneurial itch in the first place, his experiences as a founder, and the symmetry of his leadership across Beyond the Game Network and W3 Studio.  We also take a look at the market for sports-themed digital collectibles since the 2020-2021 bull run, how to build a more sustainable business at the intersection of sports and web3 by focusing on fandom rather than speculators, and how his advice to founders has evolved with the comings and goings of bulls and bears.

LINKS:

Episode title inspired by ‘The World is Yours’ by Nas

Learn more about W3 Studio:  https://w3studio.us/

Learn more about Beyond the Game Network:  https://thebtgnetwork.com/

Connect with Brian Zwerner on social media:

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/w3studioatl

-Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-zwerner/

-Twitter: https://twitter.com/BrianZwerner

-Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@bzwerner/

-TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@brianzwerner


Leave a review and subscribe on 

-Apple Podcasts:  https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/id1455819294

-Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4F8uOLxiscYVWVGEfNxTnd

MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack: https://moneyneversleeps.substack.com/

MoneyNeverSleeps website:  https://www.moneyneversleeps.ie/

Email us at info@norioventures.com


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Mar 01, 202442:56
249: Bridging the Gap | Connor Murphy | One Problem, Two Ventures and Bridging Networks

249: Bridging the Gap | Connor Murphy | One Problem, Two Ventures and Bridging Networks

This week’s guest is Connor Murphy, the CEO of Bridge. I met Connor at a Techstars event in Dublin in 2019 as he was just getting his latest venture off the ground in Bridge, and I started using the Bridge app within seconds of meeting him to help me bridge my network.

Connor Murphy is an all-around good guy, and in every conversation I have with with him, I end up connecting way more dots than I ever could have expected.  Connor has a background in computer science, startups, venture capital, and management consulting.  He was previously the Managing Director of the Techstars SAP.iO program in Berlin and he has invested in 30 pre-seed technology ventures that have an enterprise value greater than $1bn. The undercurrent for all of this was Connor’s founding of DataHug back in 2009, a collaborative forecasting and pipeline management solution that he sold to Callidus Cloud (now owned by SAP) back in 2013.  

In this episode, Connor and I riff on his DataHug founder experience, investing through Techstars and beyond, his journey as CEO of Bridge, and how all of these experiences are linked by the common threads of building relationships, trust as a currency, and kicking your network into hyperdrive.  We also talk through some of his time-tested lessons learned from his time as a startup founder and investor that guide his path and that of the founders he’s invested in as well.

BOOK REFERENCES:

The Four Steps to the Epiphany’ by Steve Blank 

The Mom Test’ by Rob Fitzpatrick

LINKS:

Learn more about Bridge and see here for a quick insight on the power of Bridge

Follow Connor Murphy on LinkedIn, X/(Twitter) and check out his blog

Episode title inspired by ‘Bridging the Gap’ by Nas

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts  |  Spotify 

Subscribe to our MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on X(Twitter): Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps  

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Feb 23, 202457:36
248: Venture Investing and Connecting the Dots [Double Episode Replay]
Feb 16, 202401:01:18
247: Money Talks with Mai Santamaria | Digital Identity, Trust, Risk and Blockchain (or not)

247: Money Talks with Mai Santamaria | Digital Identity, Trust, Risk and Blockchain (or not)

Mai Santamaria joins me once again as guest co-host as we riff on the intersection of digital ID, digital wallets, blockchain, CBDCs, and how the political regime under which an individual lives influences your senses of trust and risk. We also blow to bits my expectation that the new EU digital identity wallet will have anything to do with blockchain, contrary to what we’re seeing with digital identity frameworks in Latin America. 

Mai is one of the most helpful people I know and always has a uniquely incisive insight or two on what’s going on at the crossover of finance and emerging tech.  Mai originally featured on episode 5 of MoneyNeverSleeps back in 2018, she made a cameo on our 200th episode last year, she’s a Techstars mentor, and she recently helped me make sense of the crossover of blockchain and AI in episode 241. Mai is the Head of the Financial Advisory Unit for the Department of Finance in Ireland.

In this episode, Mai and I riff on the topic of digital identity through the lens of the new European Digital Identity Wallet brought forth by the eIDAS2 legislation, and look at digital identity regimes in Latin America through the latest news on Nubank’s expansion. With the investments I’m making right now in early stage ventures in blockchain, topics like decentralization, over-centralization, and the elements of trust and risk when it comes to how individuals feel about who has access to their data are also a focal point of this chat.

Feb 09, 202454:24
246: Evan Miyazono | Atlas Computing | Overcoming AI Risks

246: Evan Miyazono | Atlas Computing | Overcoming AI Risks

Evan Miyazono is founder and CEO of Atlas Computing, a non-profit formed late last year to help scale human control over risky AI capabilities.  I seem to be falling into a number of serendipitous situations recently where I find myself at the intersection of AI and blockchain. This week’s chat with Evan took place at that same intersection, but more at the conceptual level rather than at the hardcore technical level.

After finishing a PhD in Applie Physics at Caltech, Evan Miyazono jumped into blockchain with Protocol Labs in 2017 on a mission to build systems that affect real people.  After years as a researcher and then Head of Network Goods, Evan recently launched Atlas Computing with his co-founder with the goal of building an international standards organization of provably safe AI.

In our chat, Evan and I look at both the intended and unintended consequences of AI, how society’s own actions makes it hard to define good behavior for humans, some of the crossover points between blockchain and AI, and how Evan’s thinking about aligning stakeholders for the funding of Atlas Computing.

LINKS:

Learn more about Atlas Computing

Follow Evan Miyazono on LinkedIn and X(Twitter)  

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts  |  Spotify 

Subscribe to our MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on X(Twitter): Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps  

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Feb 01, 202439:48
245: Simon Brown from Consensys | Spot Crypto ETFs and Overcentralization

245: Simon Brown from Consensys | Spot Crypto ETFs and Overcentralization

Blockchain ecosystem advisor and researcher Simon Brown from Consensys joins me as guest co-host this week. Consensys is a leading blockchain and web3 software company whose products like MetaMask and Infura are well known to the blockchain and crypto community.

While overjoyed that spot Bitcoin ETFs finally launched, I felt like something was not quite right about it, and I wanted to go deeper. 

There is an element of over-centralization of crypto happening, and I wanted to get an expert opinion.  Through the latest news on Spot Bitcoin ETFs, the Besu outage in the Ethereum ecosystem not reported by media outlets, the creation of the PBS (or Proposer-Builder Separation) Foundation, and speculation on the next wave of Spot ETFs with ETH, Simon helps me to make sense of over-centralization of crypto and where we might go from here.

Our weekly MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter is live on Substack, subscribe to go deeper into the topics we cover on each episode.

STORIES WE COVERED:

Spot Bitcoin ETF

Gensler sees bitcoin ETF irony in light of Satoshi's mission, says he respects Sen. Warren and the law (The Block, 12-Jan-24)

BlackRock on pace to become largest bitcoin holder in the world (The Street, 15-Jan-24)


Ethereum Execution Client Outage (Besu)

Hyperledger Besu Incident Report (11-Jan-24)

X/Twitter Scenarios From Hanniabu on Geth Potential Outage (5-Jan-24)

ClientDiversity.org dashboard of consensus and execution clients 

Project Sunshine dashboard measuring the health of Ethereum decentralization


PBS (Proposer-Builder Separation) Foundation

Buterin, Coinbase and more to fund Ethereum decentralization grants (Blockworks, 21-Dec-23) 

PBS Foundation Notion site

PBS Guild Proposal with credit to Simon Brown for his contributions


LINKS:

Follow our guest co-host Simon Brown on X(Twitter) and LinkedIn

Learn more about Consensys and follow them on X(Twitter) 

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts  |  Spotify 

Subscribe to our MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on X(Twitter): Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps  

Follow us on LinkedIn:: Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps 

Jan 19, 202448:37
244: Money Talks w/ Alejandro Gutierrez | Spot Bitcoin ETF Approved | Messari’s Crypto Theses 2024 Roundup
Jan 12, 202452:52
243: Light Speed | Solana with Amira Valliani and Nick Ducoff

243: Light Speed | Solana with Amira Valliani and Nick Ducoff

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

Before my trip to Amsterdam in November for the Solana Breakpoint conference, my engagement with the Solana community over the years had been lacking. At Solana Breakpoint, I found a diverse community with a bunch of smart and engaging people building interesting projects, and I wanted to go deeper, hence this episode.

In this conversation, Amira and Nick both tell their personal stories about their path to the Solana Foundation and what they brought with them into the Solana Foundation from their past lives as startup founders.  We also riffed on my observations on the diversity of projects being built on the Solana blockchain from high-volume stablecoin networks to Triple-A games like the massive galactic game world that is Star Atlas, and we also covered what we would all like to see from web3 founders going forward.

LINKS:

Learn more about the Solana Foundation

Follow our guests on LinkedIn:  Amira Valliani  |  Nick Ducoff

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts  |  Spotify 

Subscribe to our MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on X(Twitter): Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps  

Follow us on LinkedIn:: Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps 

Dec 15, 202342:45
242: Money Talks with Paul Smyth | State of European Tech & VCs | Stablecoins, CBDCs & Privacy | Great Founders vs. Great Markets

242: Money Talks with Paul Smyth | State of European Tech & VCs | Stablecoins, CBDCs & Privacy | Great Founders vs. Great Markets

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.

Paul and I met back in 2017 shortly before I photo-bombed his stand at a fintech event in Dublin, and we’ve collaborated quite a bit since then.  He and his business partner and life partner Laura Smyth from Top Tier Recruitment were the original sponsors of MoneyNeverSleeps back in 2018, and since then, Paul has also launched the Possible.ie executive coaching business that counts me as one of their proud customers.  I was so happy with the outcome of Paul’s coaching of me that I asked him to coach the founders that we bring through the Techstars Web3 accelerator.  As one of the many hats he wears, Paul is a fantastic Coach-in-Residence for Techstars, helping startup founders find their way to positive outcomes.  

In this Money Talks segment, Paul and I kick things off with a look at the recent “State of European Tech 2023” report produced by Atomico, the on-traditional European Venture Capital firm.  We then get into some of the key issues at play with the proposed Digital Euro, and how Central Bank Digital Currency (or CBDC) adoption may be impacted by the context of privacy in personal financial transactions.  This leads us to a rundown on SocGen’s new stablecoin listed on Bitstamp exchange, and we finish with a big question on what matters more in startup success:  great founders or great markets.

 

STORIES COVERED: 

European tech funding halves to $45 billion, back to pre-Covid levels — but AI is a bright spot (CNBC, 28-Nov-23)

State of European Tech 2023

Fiery Public Hearing on Digital Euro Sees Experts Diverge on Key Issues (CoinDesk, 28-Nov-23)

France’s 3rd-largest bank, Société Générale, launches euro-pegged stablecoin (Cointelegraph, 6-Dec-23)

Reid Hoffman on the Psychology of Great Founders (The Generalist, 5-Dec-23)

LINKS:

Follow our guest co-host Paul Smyth on LinkedIn and X(Twitter)

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts  |  Spotify 

Subscribe to our MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on X(Twitter): Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps  

Follow us on LinkedIn: Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps

Dec 08, 202349:30
241: Money Talks with Mai Santamaria | Binance and CZ | Argentina's New President | Vitalik's Techno-Optimism Manifesto | Blockchain and AI Intersect

241: Money Talks with Mai Santamaria | Binance and CZ | Argentina's New President | Vitalik's Techno-Optimism Manifesto | Blockchain and AI Intersect

This week I’m joined by guest co-host Mai Santamaria, who is the Head of the Financial Advisory Unit for the Department of Finance in Ireland. Mai and I met in February 2018 at a meeting of the Irish Blockchain Expert Group which later became the industry group now referred to as Blockchain Ireland.  

She’s one of the most helpful people I know and always has a uniquely incisive insight or two on what’s going on at the crossover of finance and emerging tech when she and I catch up.  Mai originally featured on episode 5 of MoneyNeverSleeps back in 2018, she made a cameo on our 200th episode last year, she’s a Techstars mentor, and has received a ton of shout-outs from Eoin Fitzgerald and me on this podcast over the years.

In this episode, Mai and I riff on where crypto exchange Binance goes from here after pleading guilty to violations of the Bank Secrecy Act in the US and 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. 

STORIES COVERED: 

Binance CEO Resigns, Part of $4.3 Billion Settlement With US (Sporting Crypto, 27-Nov-23)

Everyone Needs a Manifesto (CoinDesk, 28-Nov-23)

My techno-optimism (Vitalik Buterin, 27-Nov-23)

Elon Musk Sees A Bright Future For Argentina Under Its New Pro-Bitcoin President (Binance Square, 21-Nov-23) 

Argentina Has a New Pro-Bitcoin President—Who Is Javier Milei? (Decrypt, 20-Nov-23)

LINKS:

Follow our guest co-host Mai Santamaria on  LinkedIn

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts  |  Spotify 

Subscribe to our MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on X(Twitter): Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps  

Follow us on LinkedIn:: Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps 

Dec 01, 202344:11
240: What’s Next with Web3 with Alex Tapscott, Justin Swart (BITKRAFT Ventures) and Sterling Campbell (Blockchain Capital)

240: What’s Next with Web3 with Alex Tapscott, Justin Swart (BITKRAFT Ventures) and Sterling Campbell (Blockchain Capital)

This week’s episode is from a session Pete Townsend hosted with Alex Tapscott, author of ‘Web3: Charting the Internet's Next Economic and Cultural Frontier’ (Harper Collins). Alex and Pete were joined by venture investors Justin Swart from BITKRAFT Ventures and Sterling Campbell from Blockchain Capital. 

In this chat, Pete asked Alex to share his thoughts on what to expect next from those building in web3.  Following this, a conversation ensued with Alex, Justin, and Sterling on the critical need for accessibility in technology, the future of web3 user growth, the role of gaming in web3 adoption, alignment of value and protocols, the movement towards decentralized physical infrastructure (DePIN) and the future of blockchain protocols.


PANELISTS:


Alex Tapscott - Author of Web3: Charting the Internet's Next Economic and Cultural Frontier (and ‘Blockchain Revolution’), Managing Director and Portfolio Manager at Ninepoint Partners, a Toronto-based alternative investment manager and Founder at Blockchain Research Institute


Justin Swart - Principal  at BITKRAFT Ventures, a global investment platform specializing in Synthetic Reality: the space where our physical and digital worlds converge. Driven by video games and gaming technology, Web3, and AI.  BITKRAFT’s portfolio includes Epic Games, Discord and Immutable.


Sterling Campbell - Investor at Blockchain Capital, partners to crypto builders since 2013, with investments including Techstars grad Arweave, Aave, Coinbase, Kraken and OpenSea.


TIMESTAMPS:

02:12 Alex Tapscott's Journey and Vision for Web 3

03:23 Justin Swartz's Gaming and Investment Background

04:27 Sterling Campbell's Career Transition to Blockchain

06:11 Discussion on Alex Tapscott's New Book on Web3

07:26 The Future of Web3 User Growth

09:17 The Convergence of Technologies in Web3

14:09 The Role of Gaming in Web3 Adoption

22:30 The Metaverse and the Future of Gaming

25:42 The Cycles of Crypto and Web3

27:13 The Importance of Aligning Value with Protocol

27:58 The Impact of Social Tokens

28:28 The Future of Protocols

30:03 The Longevity of Blockchain Capital

30:19 The Dominance of Ethereum

32:53 The Evolution of Blockchain Protocols

34:06 The User Experience in Blockchain

35:34 The Future of Decentralized Physical Infrastructure

47:07 The Regulatory Landscape of Crypto Ecosystem

LINKS:

Get in touch with the contributors to this week’s episode with the links above

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Subscribe to our MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Nov 24, 202352:07
239: Web3 Wishlist | What Would You Like Web3 Founders to Solve?

239: Web3 Wishlist | What Would You Like Web3 Founders to Solve?

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, focusing on topics such as user experience, digital identity, decentralized finance, AI, regulatory issues, and real-world applications.

The diverse panel includes John Hallahan from Fireblocks, Arry Yu from the U.S. Blockchain Coalition, Hesus Inoma from i13 Ventures, Niamh O'Connell from CasperLabs, Prashanth Swaminathan from Woodstock Fund, Sean Lee from the Crypto Council for Innovation, Clarisse Hagege from Dfns, and Lou Kerner from the Crypto Oracle Collective. The episode aims to explore and understand the current challenges and potential opportunities in the Web3 space.

00:19 Techstars Web3 Accelerator Announcement

00:47 Web3 founders' challenges and solutions

01:46 John Hallahan's Web3 Wishlist

03:43 Arry Yu's thoughts on digital identity and being the adult in the room

06:17 Hesus Inoma's insights on Web3 founders

08:27 Niamh O'Connell on self-sovereign identity

11:28 Prashanth Swaminathan's top areas for Web3

15:52 Sean Lee's perspective on Web3 tokens

18:16 Clarisse Hagege's call for real-life use cases

19:10 Lou Kerner's thoughts on balance and mistakes


CONTRIBUTORS:

John Hallahan, Director, Business Solutions & Advisory at Fireblocks, whose mission is to enable every business to easily and securely support digital assets and cryptocurrencies. (video) 

Arry Yu, is the Co-Founder and Co-Chair at the U.S. Blockchain Coalition, a coalition of state blockchain associations, organizations and influencers across the country cooperating together to ensure the United States is a leader in blockchain, Web3, and distributed ledger technologies (DLT).  

Hesus Inoma, Head of Strategy & Innovation at i13 Ventures, whose purpose is to co-create and back products and services grounded on first design principles for the new era of the web.

Niamh O’Connell, Enterprise & Partnerships Lead (U.S) at CasperLabs, the first blockchain built specifically for business adoption.  

Prashanth Swaminathan, Partner at Woodstock Fund, a thesis and research-driven fund, investing in early and growth stage Web 3.0 companies and protocols.

Sean Lee, Senior Advisor at the Crypto Council for Innovation, a global alliance of crypto industry leaders that are advocating for responsible and healthy regulations in the digital asset industry.

Clarisse Hagege, Founder & CEO at Dfns, providing web3 wallets as APIs and wallet-as-a-service infrastructure that enables crypto developers to forget about private key management so they can focus on building what matters most — their applications.

Lou Kerner, 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.

LINKS:

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Subscribe to our MoneyNeverSleeps newsletter on Substack

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Nov 17, 202321:27
238: Global Access | Sean Lee | Crypto Council for Innovation | Digital Asset Policy Creation

238: Global Access | Sean Lee | Crypto Council for Innovation | Digital Asset Policy Creation

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.

Sean has conducted business in over 20+ countries and two continents across his career, and networked with extraordinary professionals across many industries. As a technology enthusiast, his career started in Internet 1.0 during the mid ’90s, spanning across eCommerce, cloud computing, and digitalization, with IBM, EMC, Pivotal, and Dell before moving into blockchain and crypto in the last few years. Through it all he has witnessed how technology combined with innovative business models can transform industries, and ultimately global economies as well. 

In this episode, Sean and I dive into

  • How the current events in crypto point to an even greater opportunity for education, advocacy, and policy to accelerate the adoption of digital assets and blockchain technology.

  • How the Crypto Council for Innovation approaches policy frameworks to align the digital asset industry with regulators and vice-versa  

  • How far the crypto industry and regulators have come with centralized finance (CeFi) already

  • An example of policy building through the lens of decentralized finance (DeFi) with a focus on placing the regulatory lens on appropriate layers of the DeFi stack.  

  • How we approach the paraphrasing of the various definitions of web3 into terms that are accessible to non-crypto natives

  • A big change that Sean and I would both like to see in how most web3 founders think about fundraising.

LINKS:

Follow Sean Lee on LinkedIn and X/(Twitter) 

Learn more about the Crypto Council for Innovation and their DeFi regulatory policy white paper

Watch Sean Lee’s weekly ‘This Week in Crypto: Sean’s Take on Asia’ videos on YouTube 

Episode title inspired by Global Access by Young Thug (feat, Nate Ruess)

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend



Nov 10, 202350:00
237: All Around the World | Lou Kerner | Crypto Oracle Collective

237: All Around the World | Lou Kerner | Crypto Oracle Collective

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.

In addition to Lou’s roles as founder of Crypto Oracle Collective and Crypto Mondays, he’s also a partner at Blockchain Coinvestors, a venture capital fund of funds focused on investing in blockchain since 2014. Lou has a great track record of recognizing emerging trends and doubling down on them, first on Wall Street, then onto media, venture capital and now in crypto and blockchain.  

In this episode, Lou and I dive into his early career in traditional finance and community building and uncover what it was that he saw with his big crypto revelation in 2017, how he ported over his community-building experiences into crypto and blockchain, and the one thing on which he would like to see web3 founders focus.

LINKS:

Follow Lou Kerner on LinkedIn and X/(Twitter) 

Learn more about Crypto Oracle Collective and Crypto Mondays

Follow Crypto Mondays on LinkedIn 

Follow Crypto Oracle Collective on Linkedin

Episode title inspired by All Around the World by Jay-Z

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Nov 03, 202325:06
236: The Entrepreneur’s Dilemma with Somi Arian from InPeak

236: The Entrepreneur’s Dilemma with Somi Arian from InPeak

My discussion with Somi Arian is a deep dive into the entrepreneur's dilemma of solving problems vs. fulfilling desires, customer discovery, product building and pivots, all baked into a live startup mentoring session.

Somi is the founder and CEO of InPeak, an innovative platform enabling creators and businesses to build and monetize communities.  Somi is also an award-winning filmmaker, tech philosopher, and author whose work sits at the intersection of AI, blockchain, and the future of work. Her 2018 documentary, “The Millennial Disruption” won several international awards and featured industry leaders from The Economist, Marie Claire, Bentley, JLR, and Steinway.

If you’re building in web3, the next class of the Techstars Web3 accelerator takes place in spring 2024, and applications are open now. 

As web3 is global and borderless, so is Techstars Web3.  Although most of the accelerator content is delivered virtually, the class does meet up in person for a week at a time at the beginning, middle and end of the program in different cities around the world.  Jump on over to techstars.com/accelerators/web3 to apply.


LINKS:

Follow Somi Arian on LinkedIn and X/(Twitter) 

Check out the Somi Arian Podcast and learn about InPeak

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Oct 27, 202338:10
235: Reset Button | Arry Yu from the US Blockchain Coalition | Rebuilding the Internet One Startup at a Time

235: Reset Button | Arry Yu from the US Blockchain Coalition | Rebuilding the Internet One Startup at a Time

Arry Yu is a 23+ year emerging technology industry veteran, serial founder and strategic operator with expertise in scaling business from "zero to one" with a consistent track record building high-performing teams. In this episode, Arry shares her story on her path into crypto and blockchain from the roots of her early corporate career into becoming a startup founder, investor and Executive Director and Co-Founder of the U.S. Blockchain Coalition (USBC).

Arry also sheds some light on the paradox that is the US attitude towards crypto, with the overwhelming majority of venture capital investment in crypto companies coming from the same country whose innovators have to withstand such a toxic regulatory view of crypto.  We then round things out with Arry’s views on investing in web3 founders and their startups, and some of the ups and downs that come with the territory.

In addition to her role leading the U.S. Blockchain Coalition (USBC), Arry Yu is also the founding Chair of the Cascadia Blockchain Council. Yu also works in venture capital as she serves as the Managing Director of Yellow Umbrella Ventures and Venture Partner with Startup Haven Fund. 

She also regularly serves as an educator, as Adjunct Professor and instructor for various academic institutions like the Saudi Digital Academy, Coding Dojo, Portland State University and the University of Washington Tacoma Milgard School of Business. 

An innovator, public speaker, and writer, she has been widely published in national media outlets including Forbes, CNN Money, U.S. News & World Report, Geekwire and more. Over the years, Yu has worked with both investors and developers across four continents to launch both SaaS and consumer products.

LINKS:

Follow Arry Yu on LinkedIn and X/(Twitter) 

Learn more about the US Blockchain Coalition and Yellow Umbrella Ventures 

Episode title inspired by Reset Button by XV (feat. Talib Kweli)

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Oct 20, 202345:52
234: Money Talks with Pet Berisha from Sporting Crypto | Who’s Following the SBF Trial? | State of Crypto Fundraising | Volume Drivers in Web3 Gaming and Collectibles

234: Money Talks with Pet Berisha from Sporting Crypto | Who’s Following the SBF Trial? | State of Crypto Fundraising | Volume Drivers in Web3 Gaming and Collectibles

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.

In this episode, Pet and Pete dive into whether or not the Sam Bankman-Fried trial actually matters, without digging into all of the gory details, and they also look at the state of crypto fundraising through the lens of Messari’s report of the same name for Q3 2023. They also talk through the latest news on Web3 gaming with the story of how one game from the team behind the massively multiplayer online role-playing game Star Atlas drove transaction volumes on the Solana blockchain to unexpected levels.

The Sporting Crypto newsletter is read by leaders from Meta, the EPL, Candy Digital, NBA, LaLiga, MLB, Sorare and many more. Sporting Crypto is also multi-media, with a podcast interviewing 15 industry leaders at the intersection, and they also host industry-leading events on a regular basis. 

Sporting Crypto is also an advisory and consultancy service that has worked with Adidas, Infront Sport, COPA90, Universal Music, Flannels, Karate Combat, W3FC and more.

Pet Berisha is hosting two upcoming Sporting Crypto in-person events in London and NYC, check them out below:

-London, 25th October: https://www.sportingcrypto.com/events/event-three-448m9

-NYC, 16th November: https://www.sportingcrypto.com/events/event-three-448m9-srkzf

Finally, the Techstars Web3 accelerator is now open for applications for the class of 2024.  If you’re building in web3, jump over to Techstars Web3 to apply.

STORIES COVERED:

The Judge is So Fed Up with Sam Bankman-Fried’s Lawyers (Slate, 5-Oct-23)

State of Crypto Fundraising (Messari, 5-Oct-23)

Just One Game on Solana Is Doing More Daily Transactions Than All of Polygon (Decrypt, 9-Oct-23)

LINKS:

Follow Pet Berisha on LinkedIn and X/Twitter

Subscribe to the Sporting Crypto newsletter

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Oct 13, 202342:25
233: Money Talks w/ Elliott Griffin | Pete’s Path into Crypto | Venture Investing from Ireland | Founder-VC Relationships | Inside Techstars

233: Money Talks w/ Elliott Griffin | Pete’s Path into Crypto | Venture Investing from Ireland | Founder-VC Relationships | Inside Techstars


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.


In this episode, Elliott and Pete Townsend share a few stories on venture investing, Pete’s path into crypto, working with founders before and after investing in them, building products that people actually want, what it’s like inside a Techstars program, the power of founder market fit, founders and investors being accountable to each other, how to get the attention of VCs, why Pete is still doing MoneyNeverSleeps after all of these years and learning from our mistakes.


LINKS:


Follow Elliott Griffin on LinkedIn and learn more about BVP on their website


Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 


Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com


Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend


Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Oct 06, 202338:49
232: Evolution | Eva Lawrence, Figment and Staking Digital Assets

232: Evolution | Eva Lawrence, Figment and Staking Digital Assets

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

In this episode, we get into Eva’s evolution from a legal mind into institutional trading, and her slow-burn crypto awakening before jumping from the institutional world into the great wide open of crypto back in 2018.  We also step through her role at Figment, look at the importance of staking now and into the future, and use the Wayback Machine that is X/Twitter to figure out what makes Eva do what she does.

Eva Lawrence has a diverse career across law, trading, business development, and strategy. Eva has been in the crypto space since 2018 and was previously COO of Arcane Crypto, a Nordic-listed crypto platform. She has 8+ years of experience in finance, primarily at Morgan Stanley, where she was Head of EMEA Flow Trading for Securities Lending after working in FX Prime Brokerage. In addition, Eva is a UK-qualified lawyer, with experience in digital assets, securities, funds, and financial services.

LINKS:

Follow Eva Lawrence on LinkedIn and X/(Twitter) 

Learn more about Figment and follow Figment on LinkedIn and X/(Twitter) 

Episode title inspired by Evolution by Joyner Lucas

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Follow us on LinkedIn:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Sep 29, 202329:59
231: Money Talks w/ Alejandro Gutierrez | NFT Takedowns by SEC | Visa, Solana & Stablecoins | Mark Cuban Hacked | Citi’s Token Service

231: Money Talks w/ Alejandro Gutierrez | NFT Takedowns by SEC | Visa, Solana & Stablecoins | Mark Cuban Hacked | Citi’s Token Service

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’. 

In this episode, Alejandro and Pete Townsend riff on the SEC cracking down on NFTs as a fundraising tool by looking at the Mila Kunis-backed Stoner Cats project and that of LA-based media company Impact Theory. They also step through the story of Visa integrating the Solana blockchain for USDC settlements, Mark Cuban getting hacked, Citi’s new token service, and have some fun with emerging tech hype cycles and Patagonia vests.

STORIES COVERED: 

NFT Takedowns

What Happens to Mila Kunis' Stoner Cats NFTs After SEC Settlement? (Decrypt, 13-Sep-23)

SEC settles first NFT enforcement case, fines LA media company $6M (TechCrunch, 29-Aug-23)

Visa+Solana+USDC

‘A Huge Deal’—Visa Reveals Crypto Payments Bombshell (Forbes, 7-Sep-23)

Long Take: Visa, Worldpay, and Nuvei settling transactions using stablecoin USDC on Solana (Fintech Blueprint by Lex Sokolin, 6-Sep-23)

Mark Cuban Hacked

Mark Cuban Loses Nearly $1M to Crypto Scam (CoinDesk, 18-Sep-23)

Billionaire Mark Cuban Loses $870,000 In Crypto Scam (Decrypt, 16-Sep-23)

Citi’s New Token Service

Citigroup Debuts Token Service in Latest Foray Into Digital Assets (Bloomberg, 18-Sep-23)

Citi Token Services will provide payments, liquidity to institutional customers (Cointelegraph, 18-Sep-23)

LINKS:

Follow our guest co-host Alejandro Gutierrez on X(Twitter) and LinkedIn

Learn more about Defactor Labs and follow them on X(Twitter) 

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts  |  Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on X(Twitter): Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps  

Follow us on LinkedIn: Pete Townsend  |  MoneyNeverSleeps

Sep 22, 202340:51
230: Vision Clear | Asad J. Malik, Jadu and Bringing Augmented Reality to Life

230: Vision Clear | Asad J. Malik, Jadu and Bringing Augmented Reality to Life

Asad J. Malik is an augmented reality pioneer and the founder and CEO of Jadu, a next-gen multiplayer augmented reality fighting game for your phone launching this month.  In Jadu, players can settle or start rivalries with friends or compete against strangers for fame and glory in this combat game from the future. 

Malik’s critically acclaimed and globally exhibited narrative storytelling projects Terminal 3 and A Jester’s Tale premiered at Tribeca and Sundance Film Festivals, positioning Asad as a visionary in the space before completing his undergraduate degree. Asad was named one of Variety’s 10 Innovators to Watch, Rolling Stone’s Future 25, Forbes’ 30 Under 30, Adweek’s Young Influentials, and also made The Independent’s Filmmakers to Watch list. He sits on the Board of Trustees for Bennington College as a recent graduate.

In this episode, Pete Townsend and Asad get into the formative experiences that influenced Asad’s desire to bring Jadu to life, before going deeper into the story of Jadu and the complex mechanics of augmented reality and fighting avatars.  Asad and Pete also talk about bringing together a community of gamers from all walks of life and explore a few themes at the intersection of gaming, augmented reality, and society.

LINKS:

Join the Jadu community on Discord and X/Twitter

Follow Asad J. Malik on Instagram 

Episode title inspired by Vision Clear by Lil’ Baby

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Sep 15, 202339:09
229: Money Talks w/ Laura Walsh | Grayscale Spot Bitcoin ETF | Loyalty and Digital Assets | New Web3 VCs | Elon's Job Board

229: Money Talks w/ Laura Walsh | Grayscale Spot Bitcoin ETF | Loyalty and Digital Assets | New Web3 VCs | Elon's Job Board

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.

We also look at the positioning of NFTs or ‘dynamic digital assets’ as the core technology to drive more expansive yet personalized loyalty programs for big brands and sports teams, all through the lens of Pet Berisha’s Sporting Crypto newsletter.  Laura also gave us a run-down of two new web3 venture capital funds from MoonPay and Vessel Capital, and we also exercised our right to ask ‘what the heck Elon Musk is up to now?’.

With over 6 years of experience in the blockchain and web3 space, Laura Walsh is a passionate and innovative entrepreneur, mentor, and consultant. She founded, invested in, and advised multiple startups in the gaming, esports, and decentralized finance sectors, leveraging her extensive network, knowledge, and skills in the industry.

As an Entrepreneur in Residence at Techstars, Laura supports and guides 12 promising web3-based startups, helping them with their go-to-market strategies, fundraising, and scaling. She also collaborates with other web3 experts, investors, and stakeholders to foster a vibrant and inclusive ecosystem. Her mission is to bring the future of finance to today and empower the next generation of entrepreneurs with the tools and resources they need to succeed.

STORIES COVERED:

Grayscale wins SEC suit on Bitcoin ETF

The Real Reasons the Grayscale Bitcoin ETF Decision Matters (Coindesk, 29-Aug-23)

Crypto vs SEC: What Grayscale’s court victory means for bitcoin ETFs (FT, 30-Aug-23)

Web3 to Web2 Crossover

Web3 Loyalty: Buzzword or Breakthrough? (Sporting Crypto by Pet Berisha, 4-Sep-23)

Web3 VCs still launching new funds

MoonPay launches venture arm to invest in web3 infra, gaming and fintech (TechCrunch, 29-Aug-23)

Vessel Capital emerges from stealth with $55M fund focused on web3 infrastructure and apps (TechCrunch, 24-Aug-23)

What’s Elon up to? 

Elon Musk's X takes on LinkedIn, releases Beta version of job hiring platform for verified companies (Business Today, 26-Aug-23)

LINKS:

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts  |  Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter: Pete Townsend  |  Laura Walsh  |  MoneyNeverSleeps  

Follow us on LinkedIn: Pete Townsend  |  Laura Walsh  |  MoneyNeverSleeps

Sep 08, 202352:13
228: The Recipe | Liang Wu and Dan Herrera | Evolving Internet Insights | AI, Web3 and Emerging Tech

228: The Recipe | Liang Wu and Dan Herrera | Evolving Internet Insights | AI, Web3 and Emerging Tech

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. 

In addition to his role as the Co-founding Managing Partner at Eleven26 Capital, Liang is also a Senior Researcher at Harvard Business School where he researches Web3 and AI, and writes Web3 and AI cases for the MBA curriculum. He also supports and leads growth and community at Harvard’s Crypto Lab. Liang writes regularly on his Evolving Internet Insights newsletter (@ https://evolvinginternetclub.beehiiv.com/), where he and Dan Herrera curate the most interesting emerging tech stories and add their analysis, insights, and so-whats on top. His professional background is a mix of startups, venture capital, and management consulting. This is Liang’s second time on the show and you can hear his full story on episode 209.

Dan Herrera is also a Co-founding Managing Partner at Eleven26 Capital. Beyond this role, Dan advises a portfolio of venture capital firms and family offices, spearheading everything from portfolio construction and strategy setting to deploying capital for and operationalizing these firms. Dan writes regularly with Liang on the Evolving Internet Insights newsletter, and his professional background is also a mix of venture capital, startups, and management consulting.

LINKS:

Read and subscribe to Liang and Dan’s Evolving Internet Insights newsletter 

Follow Liang Wu on LinkedIn and Twitter, or connect by email at liang@e26c.co

Follow Dan Herrera on LinkedIn and Twitter or connect by email at dan@e26c.co

Episode title inspired by The Recipe by Kendrick Lamar ft. Dr. Dre

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@norioventures.com

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Pete Townsend

Sep 01, 202357:27
227: Encore | Eoin Fitzgerald’s Last Dance & Techstars Web3 Recap
Aug 04, 202342:16
226: Pursuit of Happiness | Neal Peters, JR Studio and Giving Game Creators Superpowers

226: Pursuit of Happiness | Neal Peters, JR Studio and Giving Game Creators Superpowers

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.

JR Studio is also one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023.

After launching his first business as a 14-year-old gamer building websites, Neal spent 18 years as an IT architect and in public/private/hybrid cloud, software development, and blockchain.  He also co-founded and led a venture capital business during the last crypto bull run focused on web3 gaming and NFTs, and that was the step that led him towards getting together with Marco Colaco and Aleks Gecevski in 2022 to build what has become JR Studio.

In this episode, Neal and Pete Townsend riff on his earliest days in tech and the eventual path that he took with Marco and Aleks with JR Studio, before diving into what JR-Studio is now and what it will become. We also get into the long arc of infrastructure and innovation we’ll need to get to the Hollywood vision of the metaverse, and the role of gaming in that journey, along with what Neal points to in his own development as a founder that helps to keep things moving.

LINKS:

Learn more about JR Studio

Connect with Neal Peters on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow JR Studio on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘Pursuit of Happiness’ by Kid Cudi (Steve Aoki remix)

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@moneyneversleeps.ie

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Jun 23, 202331:52
225: California Love | Federico Panisi, Loki.code and Smart Contracts Made Easy

225: California Love | Federico Panisi, Loki.code and Smart Contracts Made Easy

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.

Loki.code is also one of the 12 founding teams forming the https://www.techstars.com/newsroom/announcing-the-techstars-web3-class-of-2023.

Before founding Loki.code in July 2022 with Pedro Wilson, Fabio Manzani, Adam Toth-Fejel, and Malachy Lin-Nugent, Federico’s time in academia included a law degree and a Ph.D. in Law & Business in his home country of Italy with stints in Sydney and Hong Kong, before rounding things out with a Master's in Legal Studies at Stanford Law School with a thesis on smart contracts. Federico is passionate about Web3, smart contracts, and cryptocurrency technologies, so he’s come to the right place!

In this episode, Federico and Pete Townsend riff on the serendipity of how he became an entrepreneur before diving into what Loki.code is now and what it will become.  Federico and Pete also get into the importance of infrastructure and developer tools in getting us to one billion users of web3, building trust with your co-founders, and the surprising intersection of crypto with Dungeons & Dragons.

LINKS:

Learn more about Loki.code

Connect with Federico Panisi on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow Loki.code on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘California Love’ by 2Pac ft. Dr. Dre & Roger

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@moneyneversleeps.ie

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Jun 20, 202344:47
224: Power to the People II | Tatiana Botskina, Mintycode and Fixing Open Source

224: Power to the People II | Tatiana Botskina, Mintycode and Fixing Open Source

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. Mintycode is also one of the 12 startups forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023. 

Before founding Mintycode in January 2022, Tatiana began her career as a lawyer before returning to academia and adding disciplines in international finance, machine learning, and blockchain development, Through her time in academia and also through working with startups, Tatiana developed strong beliefs in digital transformation powered by artificial intelligence and global decentralization.

In this episode, Tatiana and Pete Townsend dive into her background that inspired her passion for fairness and justice, her approach to developing Mintycode’s competitive edge, and the natively collaborative context of Mintycode as a platform and a community.  Tatiana and Pete also talk through some of the challenges she’s faced so far as a founder/CEO, and also her love for hackathons.

LINKS:

Learn more about Mintycode

Connect with Tatiana Botskina on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow Mintycode on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘Power to the People’ by Public Enemy

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@moneyneversleeps.ie

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Jun 16, 202330:04
223: Eye Know | Terence Reilly, OLTA and the Art of the Creator Protocol

223: Eye Know | Terence Reilly, OLTA and the Art of the Creator Protocol

Terence Reilly is the co-founder and CEO of OLTA, one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023.

OLTA is 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.

Before co-founding OLTA with George Baldwin in 2021, Terence spent 20 years working on 3D character animation projects, including the movies Jurassic World, Iron Man 2, and Paul & Chappie with clients such as Disney, Sony, Google and Aardman, the Academy Award-winning animation studio.

In this episode, Terence and Pete Townsend explore the relationship between art and technology before diving into the deep first-hand experience that Terence has with the problem that OLTA is solving for creative coders and studios.  Terence and Pete also talk through some examples of the OLTA protocol in action, the big opportunity that is the global art market, and what keeps Terence moving through the ups and downs of being a startup founder.

LINKS:

Learn more about OLTA

Connect with Terence Reilly on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow OLTA on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘Eye Know’ by De La Soul ft. Otis Redding

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@moneyneversleeps.ie

Follow us on Twitter: MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Jun 09, 202341:03
222: Trust | Javier Tamashiro, Ospree and Crypto Compliance Made Simple

222: Trust | Javier Tamashiro, Ospree and Crypto Compliance Made Simple

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.

Javier and his Ospree co-founders Anne Winston and Jukka Pellinen are one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023. 

By connecting to premium on-chain and off-chain data suppliers, Ospree offers a centralized repository of high-quality alerts for risk and compliance teams. With Ospree, institutions and SMEs serving the crypto and wider digital asset markets today can significantly reduce false positives, benefit from a single point of reference for Travel Rule data transactions, and automate and scale essential compliance operations.

Before co-founding Ospree in 2019, Javier’s tour of duty in TradFi included stops at S&P Global Market Intelligence, Standard Chartered Bank and Credit Suisse.  At each stop along the way, Javier operated in business intelligence and regtech roles, and he has been actively involved in blockchain projects since 2014. 

In this episode, Javier and Pete Townsend explore the blend of Japanese and Argentinian cultures that made Javier who he is today, and the life experiences that led him to the Ospree vision. We then dive into crypto market growth as a proxy for the wider growth of digital assets, and the role that compliance solutions can play in opening up the crypto floodgates for institutional capital.

LINKS:

Learn more about Ospree

Connect with Javier Tamashiro on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow Ospree on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘Trust’ by NF

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@moneyneversleeps.ie

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Jun 02, 202337:01
221: First Chain | Greg Hannam, Peerkat, and the Power of NFT Data

221: First Chain | Greg Hannam, Peerkat, and the Power of NFT Data

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.

Peerkat is also one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023.

Peerkat combines multiple data sources with machine learning to connect the dots between web2 and web3 and provide powerful insights into user behavior across disparate platforms.

Before co-founding Peerkat with Ben Marshall and Ike Iwumene, Greg’s roots bring him back to mechanical engineering at the University of Leeds before diving headfirst into deep data analytics and product management.  Greg then worked with a number of VC-backed deep tech startups in the AI space developing product, growth, and operations functions.


LINKS:

Learn more about ⁠Peerkat⁠

Connect with Greg Hannam on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow Peerkat on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘First Chain’ by Big Sean ft. Nas and Kid Cudi

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

May 26, 202339:10
220: The Message | Howie Young, Protico and the Universal Chatting Interface

220: The Message | Howie Young, Protico and the Universal Chatting Interface

Howie Young is the founder and CEO of Protico, a universal chatting interface that enables web3 chat on apps in seconds for enterprises that want to migrate business and engage customers at the web3 level. 

Protico is also one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023.

With over eight years of experience in the chat and messaging industry, Howie Young is a highly skilled and dedicated professional who has built a reputation for delivering innovative and user-focused solutions. Combining a strong foundation in business with extensive self-taught technical expertise, Howie has contributed to the development of numerous successful and creative products that are used in more than 100 countries around the world.

Also, Howie has been fueling his creative mind as the founder of a co-working space for the startup ecosystem back home in Taipei, Taiwan since 2014.

In this episode, Howie and Pete Townsend riff on his life experiences to date that led him to launch Protico before digging into Howie’s first steps into the market with Protico’s MVP and how he expects network effects will follow.  We also get into the crossover of web2 users into web3, some of the key challenges Howie sees ahead, and his big ‘earned secret’ from his life in startup ecosystems.

LINKS:

Learn more about Protico

Connect with Howie Young on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow Protico on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘The Message’ by Nas

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

May 23, 202333:06
219: Footprints | Deb Pratiher and Quest Labs

219: Footprints | Deb Pratiher and Quest Labs

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.

Quest Labs is also one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023.

Deb Pratiher is a product leader and engineer with experience building and scaling data infrastructure and systems at big tech companies. She is passionate about AI and web3 and the intersection of both. Prior to starting Quest she worked and researched at Nvidia, Visa, Tesla, and Carnegie Mellon University, as she was chosen for the highly selective Kleiner Perkins Fellowship Program.

In this episode, Deb and Pete Townsend speed-run through her life experiences that brought her to the point of co-founding Quest Labs, before we dig into why the world needs what Quest are bringing to market right now   We also talk through the interplay of owning your own data on this big wonderful creation called the internet, and how that drives the network effect that will deliver the future that Quest is running toward

LINKS:

Learn more about Quest Labs

Connect with Deb Pratiher on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow Quest Labs on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘Footprints’ by A Tribe Called Quest

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

May 19, 202338:42
218: Dollar and a Dream | Igor Khmel and SaveChain

218: Dollar and a Dream | Igor Khmel and SaveChain

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.

SaveChain is also one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023.

Originally from Ukraine but now based in the US, Igor Khmel has been honing his craft for the past 17 years, including experience in the investment banking and corporate finance practice of Deloitte and McKinsey, a Stanford MBA, then in venture and as an entrepreneur in residence with Sberbank, and he’s now a third-time founder in fintech and crypto.

In this episode, Igor and Pete Townsend slide down the arc of Igor’s life in finance and ventures that led to his inspiration for SaveChain, the societal factors driving the need to pair a USD bank account with a stablecoin wallet, how Igor expects the SaveChain customer experience will evolve, and the hurdles that SaveChain will need to clear to scale globally

LINKS:

Learn more about SaveChain

Connect with Igor Khmel on LinkedIn and Twitter

Follow SaveChain on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘Dollar and a Dream’ by The Game

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

May 12, 202336:35
217: Payday | Lee Gray and SonX

217: Payday | Lee Gray and SonX

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. SonX is also one of the 12 founding teams forming the Techstars Web3 accelerator class of 2023.

In this episode, Lee and Pete Townsend dig into why it made so much sense for Lee to launch SonX alongside his co-founder Lewis Donovan, some of the ins and outs of the music industry that point to the need for SonX, Lee’s longer-term vision for SonX, and the core challenge of uniting musicians and their superfans.

LINKS:

Learn more about SonX

Connect with Lee Gray on Instagram or email

Follow SonX on Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘Payday’ by Doja Cat

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

May 05, 202334:17
216: One Tribe | Katerina Bohle Carbonell, TogetherCrew and Web3 Communities

216: One Tribe | Katerina Bohle Carbonell, TogetherCrew and Web3 Communities

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.  

Katerina’s life’s work goes broad and deep on how members of teams and communities attract, engage and retain new contributors, and how people collaborate and co-create within communities - collectively known as ‘network science’.  With the advent of DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations) in the last few years and the massive opportunity to apply network science to web3 communities, Katerina joined up with Daniel Ospina and Ashish Gangrade to co-lead TogetherCrew in 2022.

Katerina and Pete Townsend dig into how her life’s work led her to TogetherCrew, what TogetherCrew is doing right now, the longer-term vision for TogetherCrew when virtual organizations become the norm, the challenges that Katerina expects they’ll face on the way there.

LINKS:

Learn more about TogetherCrew

Connect with Katerina Bohle Carbonell on Twitter

Follow TogetherCrew on Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘One Tribe’ by Black Eyed Peas

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Apr 28, 202338:54
215: I Left My Wallet | Jesse Phillips and TrustWare

215: I Left My Wallet | Jesse Phillips and TrustWare

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.

TrustWare is a secure, recoverable, non-custodial crypto vault that connects users in a social network for sharing value. Jesse is a seasoned entrepreneur and deep thinker in the blockchain space, who is on a mission to revolutionize the way we handle digital assets and payments. With a deep understanding of decentralized technologies and their potential to empower individuals and communities, Jesse is dedicated to creating secure and democratic solutions for the future of finance and security.

LINKS

Learn more about TrustWare

Connect with Jesse Phillips on LinkedIn or by email

Follow Trustware on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘I Left My Wallet in El Segundo’ by A Tribe Called Quest

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Apr 20, 202345:11
214: World Class | Techstars Web3 Class of 2023

214: World Class | Techstars Web3 Class of 2023

This episode features a rundown of the 12 web3 founding teams that form the Techstars Web3 class of 2023, along with an intro to each of their CEOs. 

Builders gotta build, and build better.

That was the Techstars Web3 rallying cry when Pete Townsend and Hugh McGirr opened up applications for the Techstars Web3 2023 cohort in November 2022, as finding those building for the long-term - rather than chasing token markets - was the priority.  

Each one of these 12 founding teams embody web3 in their own way, whether they’re building web3 companies, communities, or economies. Techstars found these founding teams all over the world from Taiwan to the West Coast of the US, and they’re building web3 infrastructure, ‘DeFi Mullets’, DAO tooling, and creator ecosystems.

LINKS

Learn more about the Techstars Web3 Class of 2023 and connect with each team here

Follow Techstars Web3 on LinkedIn and Twitter

Episode title inspired by World Class by Snoop Dogg and Wiz Khalifa

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend



Apr 14, 202319:12
213: In the Middle | Patrick Pinschmidt and MiddleGame Ventures

213: In the Middle | Patrick Pinschmidt and MiddleGame Ventures

Patrick Pinschmidt is a General Partner and Co-Founder at MiddleGame Ventures, a financial technology venture capital fund focused on early-stage investments in Europe.

In this episode, Patrick riffs with Pete Townsend on the life experiences that delivered him to venture capital and what Patrick looks for in fintech founders in the context of MiddleGame Ventures’ Irish seed fund. Patrick and Pete also dive into Patrick’s lessons learned as an investor, investing in lines not dots, and the human focus of early-stage investing.


LINKS:

Learn more about MiddleGame Ventures on their website


Follow Patrick Pinschmidt on LinkedIn and Twitter


Episode title inspired by In the Middle by G-Eazy


Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify 


Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@moneyneversleeps.ie


Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Mar 31, 202337:46
212: Money Talks: Opening the Bitcoin Floodgates | Grayscale vs SEC | Open Banking Meets AI
Mar 24, 202342:49
211: Money Talks: Lessons Learned from 1,000 Startup Deals | The American Bankpocalypse

211: Money Talks: Lessons Learned from 1,000 Startup Deals | The American Bankpocalypse

Eoin Fitzgerald and Pete Townsend take a quick look at the triumvirate of bank failures in the US with Silvergate, Silicon Valley Bank, and Signature Bank before Eoin asks Pete about his lessons learned from seeing over 1,000 deals in the last 18 months, so they riff on easy-to-remember mental models, investing in lines not dots, building relationships with founders, how those relationships evolve post-investment, and the founder having the most credible voice in the room.

STORIES COVERED:

When it Rains it Pours (Liang Wu, Life in Color blog, 13-Mar-23)

Signals: "SVB, Signature, & Silvergate"-gate (Nik Milanovich, This Week in Fintech, 14-Mar-23)

Should I Keep My Money in Bitcoin or a Bank? (Daniel Kuhn, CoinDesk, 14-Mar-23)

HIGHLIGHTS:

1 - Have a framework - something that you know cold and can work into a conversation with founders, and repetition is really the only way to build the framework into a true mental model.  Pete uses the Techstars framework of ‘team, market, traction, idea’.

2 - Lines not dots - reaching an investment decision takes multiple interactions, multiple dots that connect to form a timeline.  That timeline either reaches a peak and plateaus at a deal or drops off quickly and then crashes and burns. You need to increase the depth and breadth of those lines by bringing in people you trust to talk to founders you’re interested in and gather more insights.

3 - After the investment - shifting the narrative post-investment is critical, especially when the founder is raising their first round. You need to teach founders not just how to fish, but also how to find the right pond.  That bank balance you funded as an investor will erode quickly if the founder doesn’t make it to their next round.

4 - The Founder’s voice - the founder has the most credible voice in the room, and they need to find their voice.  After your own investment, you can do all of the coaching you want, but you can’t pitch for the founder. All you can do is make thoughtful introductions and hope they put their best foot forward to raise their round.

LINKS:

Sam Hinkie on Invest Like the Best episode 204 and episode 88

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@moneyneversleeps.ie

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Mar 16, 202341:27
210: Money Talks | Web3 Gender Gap | Pitching the Right VCs | Revolut’s Neo-Profits | WhatsApp Goes Big in Brazil
Mar 10, 202342:38
209: Word is Bond | Liang Wu | Writing and Investing in Web3

209: Word is Bond | Liang Wu | Writing and Investing in Web3

Liang Wu is the Co-founding Managing Partner at Eleven26 Capital, an early-stage VC fund investing in diverse founders on the evolving Internet across Web2 and Web3.

Liang is also a Web3 Research Fellow at Harvard Business School where he helps shape the Web3 curriculum by writing case studies on leading Web3 companies, as well as supporting community building and business development for Harvard’s Crypto Lab.

He writes regularly on his Life in Color blog where he explores the “Why” behind Web3. His professional background is a mix of startups, venture capital and management consulting, and Liang is also a mentor for the Techstars Web3 accelerator.

In this episode, Liang riffs with Pete Townsend on his one-year reflections on writing his weekly Life in Color blog, including thoughts on chasing his curiosity, growth and flywheels in content creation, shamelessness as a superpower, and how all of these experiences inform his journey as an investor.

LINKS

Subscribe to Liang Wu’s Life in Color blog

Follow Liang Wu on Twitter and LinkedIn

Episode title inspired by Word is Bond by Brand Nubian

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Mar 03, 202301:01:31
208: MoneyTalks: US Crypto Crackdown | Apple + NBA Top Shot | Solaris Setback | Revolut’s Irish Trojan Horse
Feb 24, 202348:03
207: What Makes a Great Web3 Team
Feb 03, 202325:23
206: Sure Shot | Dee Coakley and Boundless

206: Sure Shot | Dee Coakley and Boundless

Dee Coakley is the co-founder and CEO of Boundless, the operating system for your international team, which she co-founded with Emily Castles in Ireland in 2019. Boundless is ‘global employment made simple, with benefits, share options and payroll in one neat platform’.

In this episode, Dee riffs with Eoin Fitzgerald and Pete Townsend on the snowball effect of the diverse international experiences and relationships that made Boundless such a no-brainer for her to co-found, the shifting mindsets, societal changes and competitive landscape that have made remote working and distributed international teams a scalable reality, the benefit of tight alignment with your seed investors, and how Dee is thinking about the next steps to grow the Boundless business.

LINKS

Learn more about Boundless and follow Boundless on Twitter

Connect with Dee Coakley on LinkedIn and follow her on Twitter

Episode title inspired by Sure Shot by the Beastie Boys

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Jan 27, 202348:37
205: Memory Lane | Sam Williams and Arweave

205: Memory Lane | Sam Williams and Arweave

Sam Williams is co-founder and CEO of Arweave, a blockchain protocol allowing us to remember and preserve valuable information, apps, and history indefinitely. Pete Townsend interviewed Sam last month on the Techstars GiveFirst podcast, so thanks to David Cohen and Techstars for letting us share the interview for this episode of MoneyNeverSleeps.

In this episode, Sam shares the inspirational story of how Arweave got started, their life-changing experience with Techstars Berlin in 2018, and how their long-term vision, hope, and resilience have been the foundation of their successes to date.

LINKS:

Learn more about Sam Williams and follow Sam on Twitter

Learn more about Arweave and follow Arweave on Twitter

Episode title inspired by ‘Memory Lane (Sittin’ in da Park)’ by Nas

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Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Jan 20, 202327:34
204: MoneyTalks: Silvergate Buries Diem | Jack Ma Done | Bitcoin vs. Ethereum vs. YouTube | Farming Yield and CheeseFi

204: MoneyTalks: Silvergate Buries Diem | Jack Ma Done | Bitcoin vs. Ethereum vs. YouTube | Farming Yield and CheeseFi

This week, Eoin Fitzgerald and Pete Townsend riff on Eoin’s new role at Enterprise Ireland, the final nail in the coffin for Meta’s former crypto project Diem, the next steps for Ant Group now that Jack Ma is formally out, the back and forth on the environmental impact of crypto and bitcoin’s role, some new ideas on agri-finance thanks to past guest Nik Milanovich, and some details on an event Pete’s co-hosting for Techstars Web3 with Genesis Block and Union Square Ventures in New York City on 17-Jan-23.

This episode of MoneyNeverSleeps is sponsored by SecuriCentrix. SecuriCentrix is a trusted cyber security company with offices in Dublin, Cape Town and London. SecuriCentrix provides expert advisory services, primarily in the finance and fintech industries, with tailored security solutions to fit your specific needs and regulatory challenges.

STORIES COVERED

Silvergate buries Diem; lays off 200 staff (Finextra & CoinDesk, 6-Jan-23)

Jack Ma out of Ant group (Fintech Blueprint, 9-Jan-23)

Cryptocurrency mining and trading devastating the planet? (Finextra, 6-Jan-23)

GBTC Leverage Death Rattle? With Steven McClurg (What Bitcoin Did, 9-Jan-23)

The Next Fintech Revolution: Agriculture Finance (Nik Milanovic in Forbes, 6-Jan-23)

The Italian Bank Where You Can Use Parmigiano-Reggiano Cheese As Loan Collateral (Tasting Table, 7-Jan-23)

LINKS

Leave a review and subscribe on Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Check out our MoneyNeverSleeps website and email us at info@moneyneversleeps.ie

Follow us on Twitter:  MoneyNeverSleeps  |  Eoin Fitzgerald  |  Pete Townsend

Jan 13, 202344:40