Exclusive Interview With Garlam Won, Chief Strategist Of Tip Blockchain

One of the biggest mainstream criticisms of blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies is the lack of everyday use cases. Recently, credit card companies have made it more challenging to buy and transact using cryptocurrencies. Despite these hurdles, innovative companies are creating technologies that will make everyday transactions possible. Some rely on special ecosystems and marketplaces. Others partner with companies that make transactions capable. One company, Tip Blockchain, connects users over peer-to-peer networks and merchants with payment solutions, making it easier than ever to transact using cryptocurrency. Using a wallet interface, people will be able to communicate and transact with each other directly on the platform. To learn more, Tip’s Chief Strategist, Garlam Won, gave us some insight into his background, practical advice and lessons in crypto, and Tip’s mission to make crypto easier. 1. Tell us a little bit about yourself. How did you get started in blockchain, My name is Garlam Won. Before blockchain, I was floating in different industries, including Investment Banking at JP Morgan and various different management consulting companies including Deloitte.

I fell into the blockchain world when the current founder introduced me to Bitcoin. I put some money in and watching it grow made me more curious about what this was about. 2. What was the inspiration behind Tip, How did it all start, Our founder, John Warmann, had been in cryptocurrency for some time. He realized users had to overcome a steep learning curve to use crypto. This is something most users end up getting used to and take for granted. What people do not realize is that you are not going to get the average person sending “money” or something of value by copying and pasting a 40 character hexadecimal cryptographic hash. That concept is foreign to the average non-technical person, and that is a huge blocker to mainstream adoption. John saw this as a missing link and as a huge opportunity to solve some of the less talked about problems in the space.

I had this horrible experience of losing my ETH because I sent it to a wrong address. When John came to me with an idea to simplifying crypto use in the real world using mobile interface, I knew we were solving a problem that will eventually take crypto to the mainstream. Think about this for a second. Dating, taxi, and renting movies; these industries have been completely transformed in the last few years by companies like Tinder, Uber, and Netflix that blindingly simplified the user experience. The blockchain space is currently littered with projects and functionalities that make it hard for the average user to understand, let alone use, the technology. Mainstream adoption will only be possible once people are free from checking their address 5 times, character by character before they can send money to themselves. 3. What is your competitive advantage, Our competitive advantage is our focus. Our focus on real-world use cases and powering mainstream adoption by utilizing blockchain technology in ways that have not been done before.

Integrating easy-to-use mobile payment with crypto - Mobile payment is going to be the way of life for everyone in the near future (just look at what WeChat has done in China, creating a totally cashless society). We thought mobile payment is the perfect partner and platform to go with a technology like cryptocurrency because it allows the currency to be global and liquid from the start. Discovery of information, creating an information-rich network - Right now, blockchain is inherently a black box which means we can’t see the data that’s in there. All we have is a series of seemingly random addresses and transaction hashes flying about. There is no way to discern meaningful information from looking at data on today’s blockchain networks. This is the highlight of our competitive advantage. Our vision is to store relevant information alongside accounts and transactions, in a way that makes them discoverable, accessible, and actionable. For example, you will not only have an account as an address, but you could attach an identity to it. You will not only have a transaction hash but information like who is the payment from, what is it for,

The possibilities are endless. Mobile payment is perfect for the discovery of offline data because it is so much more than things like Apple Pay. Mobile payment is much richer than just having a card in your phone. It means you are able to easily send money from one person to another. It means businesses can directly interact with their customers in a timely and relevant manner using one platform. And this is what Tip is trying to accomplish: a comprehensive ecosystem built upon discovery where users can not only transact easily across international borders but also interact with other users and businesses in meaningful ways. 4. What is the biggest problem currently in the market, Due to horrible user experience and lack of use cases of crypto, we are playing in a crypto trading bubble. We need to start integrating crypto with real-life use cases so that it can branch out into other applications in our world. This is also feeding the volatility because the value of it does not depend on anything else but people’s sentiment. 5. What does 2018 have in store for you guys,