For many years, Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies were regarded as little more than a nerdy curiosity by the financial world. But with the rise of Bitcoin and Ethereum, the process of cryptocurrencies becoming a recognized asset class has begun.

One person at the forefront of this transformation is Ari Paul. Previously a portfolio manager at the University of Chicago’s $8 billion endowment, he recently left to start the cryptocurrency hedge fund BlockTower Capital. He joined us for an insightful conversation about one of the biggest trends in the industry.

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This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/202

Enterprise consortium blockchains have gained a lot of interest in recent months. And although we can see many applications for this particular type of network deployment, many questions remain to be answered before these systems can move to production. Issues related to scaling, network deployment, access controls and key management remain open at this point. With its deep roots in the enterprise, Microsoft hopes to have answers to these questions.

Matt Kerner, Partner GM for Blockchains at Azure, joins us to discuss Coco Framework. Coco is an open-source system which promises to enable high scalability and offer confidentiality for enterprise blockchain consortiums. This novel framework leverages Trusted Execution Environments (TEE) to deliver blockchain networks with throughput comparable to database speeds.

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This episode is hosted by Meher Roy and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/201

In the past year, the first killer application of blockchain technology has emerged: venture funding. As blockchain-facilitated crowdfunding is disrupting venture capital at blistering speed, we are joined by Ciaran O’Leary, Founder and General Partner at BlueYard. BlueYard stands at the intersection of this transition. Structured as a traditional VC fund, its thesis focuses fully on the decentralized economy and it invests in tokens too. Ciaran joined us to discusses what blockchain means for VCs and its implications for BlueYard.

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This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/200

Scalability and interoperability are two of the main issues facing blockchain protocols today. In a future in which entire industries and economies rely on distributed technologies, it is unclear how blockchain networks will support massive amounts of data, and exchange transactions in a trusted way.

Peter Czaban, co-founder of Polkadot, joins us as we dive deep into the Polkadot Network. Polkadot is a heterogeneous multi-chain network, consisting of many connected chains (or parachains), all of which have their own set of features and characteristics. Transactions flow across chains, while Polkadot ensures the global security and consensus of the network, forming an ‘Internet of Blockchain networks’. Scalability is achieved through the parallel processing of transactions on the different parachains.

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This episode is hosted by Meher Roy and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/199

Nick Morgan, a former attorney at the SEC, joined us to discuss their recent report on the DAO and what it means for the ICO boom.

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This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/198