The Outlier Ventures Podcast

Mergers and Acquisitions in Crypto, with Joe Lallouz of Bison Trails

We talk with Joe Lallouz about Bison Trail’s recent acquisition by Coinbase, and why it is a net good for the wider crypto ecosystem. As a serial founder, who has now enjoyed multiple exits we hear about the process of an M&A from the inside, and explore Bisom Trail’s continuing mission to not just serve the biggest corporations in the space, like Coinbase or Facebook Libra, but the longtail of dApps and startups through a commitment to the democratization of finance technology. 

Building a DEX 2.0 on the Polkadot Network, Vivek Prasannan of Polkadex

Vivek, Executive Director of Polkadex, discusses how, by leveraging the benefits of building on Polkadot and taking the best of centralised exchanges such as order books and combining it with innovations in DEX's, they have created a hybrid model which tackles industry challenges in price slippage, impermanent loss and democratises DeFi, by removing fees and front running.

Creating Ethereum’s Internet of Blockchains, with Sandeep Nailwal of Polygon (Matic Network)

Jamie talks to Sandeep who founded Matic Network, now Polygon, about building a layer 2 network for sidechains, rollups and blockchains in a mission to fix Ethereum’s transaction limitations.

We discuss Sandeep’s road to a billion dollar network, Web 3 communities in India, multi-blockchain solutions, scaling, and the difficulties of a one-stop-shop for dApp developers.

Building Direct-to-Avatar in the Metaverse, with Ryan Gill of Crucible

Today, we talk to Ryan Gill, co-founder of Crucible Network who are pioneering direct-to-avatar commerce in the Metaverse.

We discuss the importance of innovations in self-sovereign identity (SSI) and verifiable claims standards to ensure Web 3 and the Metaverse is more open and not limited to a handful of platforms. We discuss the idea of a 'metagame for the metaverse' where its citizens can use NFTs, such as digital art, fashion and in game items, as collateral in DeFi and play-to-earn.  

This was recorded in Outlier Venture's Virtual Metaverse Studio, follow us on Twitter and YouTube to experience Jamie and Ryan's insightful discussion with visuals from The Metaverse Show.

The Case for a Permaweb, with Sam Williams of Arweave

We talk to Sam cofounder of Arweave about their radically different approach to DApps (decentralized applications) as DAOs (decentralized autonomous organizations), how he believes they will displace Web 2 platforms and companies entirely, how this vision fits with current data regulations such as GDPR in Europe, and the social mission behind The Permaweb; allowing us to remember and preserve valuable information, apps, and history indefinitely preventing others from rewriting it.

Rolling out a Global Permissionless IoT Protocol, with Amir Haleem of Helium

We talk to Amir who (alongside Shawn Fanning of Napster fame) founded Helium the world's first peer-to-peer wireless network and their decade journey to flip the telco model and create a people’s network, inspired by Bitcoin and Filecoin, to what are now 17963 Hotspots globally including partnerships Salesforce and Lime.

We talk about how they pivoted their company, built their own blockchain and hardwire devices from scratch attracting investment from Google Ventures, Khosala Ventures Munich Re and Mark Beinhoff personally.

Decentralized Finance (DeFi) for Centralized Institutions (CeFi) with Brian Mahoney of Alkemi

We explore crossing the 'crypto chasm', enabling hundreds of billions of dollars to flow from CeFi to DeFi by solving the problem of ‘The 3 Cs’: Capital, Connectivity and Control. We look at the pragmatic approach of Alkemi's cofounders, who describe their team as the living embodiment of the yin and yang required to understand, communicate and serve the needs of CeFi whilst innovating at the edge of DeFi.

 

We discuss their conservative steps towards providing sustainable yields whilst solving for the counter-party risk required by regulated entities.

Understanding the NFT Market, its Standards & Technical Trade-offs, with Alex Atallah of OpenSea

We discuss with Alex Atallah, founder and CTO of OpenSea, how the NFT market has evolved as an asset class over the last couple of years, and its various segments from art (which he believes is the ‘reference app’ for NFTs) to collectibles, virtual land and social tokens to the debates around on-chain metadata and decentralisation and its trade-offs.

 

We explore how NFTs are becoming increasingly more multimedia in form, experiential and how this new medium like, MTV or TikTok, could inform the creative format, and industries at large.  

Taking The Long Hard Path in Launching a Token, with Jason Teutsche of TrueBit

Jason Teutsche is a heavy hitting academic in computer science and mathematics who has spent a large part of his career exploring distributive systems security and incentive design.

Since writing a paper with Vitalik Buterin of Ethereum on the IICO (Interactive Initial Coin Offering) which explored new token distribution models not based on rampant price speculation seen at the time (back in the ICO mania of 2017) but genuine network adoption, he has taken the long hard path of working directly with regulators like the SEC to bring to market Truebit OS and its token to market, through what he calls a ‘micro economy’. 

 

Building the iTunes DApp Store of DeFi, with Brian Kerr of Kava

Brian, cofounder of Kava makes the argument for taking a more permissioned and curated approach to acting as a gatekeeper when onboarding users into formally trusted and verified DeFi protocols - if we want to mainstream the space and its usage.

We also discuss how DeFi will break dominance from Ethereum and become 'more DeFi', including a greater focus on Bitcoin protocol.