What do Vega, Terra, 1inch and Agoric have in common? They all have Rockaway Blockchain Fund as their investor. Based in Europe while investing globally, Rockaway has built an impressive portfolio. With corporate backing and an experienced and entrepreneurial team behind it, Rockaway is making bets on projects that aim to define the crypto space of the future.  

In this episode, I talked with David Rakusan, Investment Manager at Rockaway Blockchain Fund, to dive into its investment process and focus.

What does it take to go from zero to billions of dollars in tractions? The chart climbing L1 project Terra is seeing explosive growth in its ecosystem and product usage. Supported by real world as well as crypto users and tier-1 VCs such as Binance and Galaxy, Terra is setting its sight firmly on user adoption and value accrual for the Luna holders.   

In this episode, I talked with the CEO and Founder Do Kwon about his journey and plans for the future. 

What happens if you combine Yearn’s vaults with 1inch’s DEX liquidity aggregation while getting risk and investment management services from Numerai?

The answer - Reef Finance.

Reef Finance is looking to build out an aggregation layer on top of our fast-changing and complex DeFi landscape so that anyone can utilise and enjoy the benefits that DeFi affords. This means you can do crypto savings, investing and staking all from the same platform instead of going to a dozen different websites.

In this episode I spoke with Denko Mancheski from Reef Finance (https://reef.finance/) to look at mechanisms that enable such an user experience.

The team is building out the product and iterating on the process. Please join their Telegram group (https://t.me/reefdefi) where discussion is taking place. Please feel free to reach out to provide feedbacks.

From building startups to leading growth hacking at Dfinity, Tomahawk VC leverages its network and firsthand entrepreneurial experience in supporting founders and teams.

Have you ever wondered when you clicked on buy or sell button, who are the players that make your trade happen? What does institutional trading of crypto look like? What challenges does the industry face on the road to mass adoption?  

In the episode, I spoke with Aya Kantorovich, Head of Institutional Coverage at FalconX, to unpack and discuss these subjects.  FalconX (https://falconx.io), backed by the likes of Amex Ventures and Accel Partners, is looking to tackle the fragmentation of liquidity and lack of institutional grade trading infrastructure in crypto with its fully integrated product suite.   

What does an institutional crypto VC do? What are its investment criteria and process? How does it add value to the companies it invests in?

In today's nascent regulated digital securities market, very few players can offer a suite of fully integrated services that spans the whole lifecycle of digital securities.

Securitize, backed by Coinbase, has been pioneering and expanding its offerings in the space. Imagine if Coinbase would like to issue digital securities in the US to provide better liquidity for its shareholders prior to its IPO.

In this episode, I spoke with Jamie Finn to better understand the market and future plans.

Built for blockchain game developers, players and NFT creators in fashion and art - Enjin aims to tackle the broad NFT ecosystem with its enabling tools and markets.  Through its Dapp wallet, game development tools, upcoming L2 solution and ecosystem partners, Enjin is building the infrastructures for the intersections of blockchain gaming and NFT assets.  In this episode I spoke with Alex Russman from Enjin to look at the origin, progress and future plans of the project.

Centrifuge is a technology platform that connects DeFi to real world assets using blockchain technology. It enable companies to bring their assets on chain via our own PoS chain and enable businesses to create an on-chain credit fund using the dApp Tinlake.  

This is the first part of a multiple part series looking at the processes involved in onboarding and using the platform for both companies interested in tapping into the liquidity in DeFi and investors who would like to understand the various opportunities.  

You can find out at https://centrifuge.io/ or https://discourse.centrifuge.io/

Where do you go to create and sell your NFT artworks or insurance? What is the process for transforming traditional paintings to collectibles on blockchain? How do you program a unique unlockable feature for your NFT item? Who are the biggest selling artists in NFT space? Enter Rarible. 

Backed by Coinfund, Rarible has been busy building an art focused NFT marketplace. In this episode I spoke with Alex Salnikov to look at the origin, progress and future plans of the project.