How We Can Help Stabilize The Cryptocurrency Market, With Eiland Glover, CEO of Kowala
I had the pleasure of interviewing Eiland Glover, CEO of Kowala, a blockchain company which has created a cryptocurrency robotically pegged to the U.S. dollar, maintaining its value to that of the USD. Improving upon “asset-backed” stablecoin companies, Kowala utilizes a mathematical algorithm to peg its coin — ensuring truthful (and truly decentralized) stability.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us the story of how you got involved with the Regtech or Crypto markets?

I’m an entrepreneur who has always been interested in how the intersection between financial technology and education can help individuals prosper in market economies. When my friend and long-term collaborator, software engineer John Reitano, created one of the first privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies in 2013, I argued that he was focusing on the wrong problem. Our fervent discussions about the significance of cryptocurrency led us to an important question: “Why is no one actually using their bitcoin?” Our main answer was “volatility”. We ultimately decided to create a cryptocurrency that retained the decentralization and trustlessness of Bitcoin, while remaining price stable. That’s a relatively simple concept, but a very intricate technical problem. Two and a half years later, we’re approaching the release of our solution to the marketplace.

Can you share 5 ways that Regulation and Regtech can help stabilize the Crypto Economy?

The crypto economy remains largely unregulated and, to date, has attracted plenty of gamblers and sometimes even degenerates. Our industry has not yet delivered many impactful products and services for average consumers — in essence, successful use-cases have so far been very limited to exchanges and ICOs. We want to see this change; we want to help foster mass-adoption of cryptocurrency. To get there, the only way to jumpstart the crypto economy is to build the key stabilization infrastructure, while providing people with a compelling reason to get started with crypto in the first place.

What are the top concerns that crypto firms should be considering in order to have a competitive edge?

How can a crypto firm have a competitive edge? Well, to date, the winning strategy has been to publish a white paper, build up community excitement about the project’s team, advisors, and partnerships, and then launch a token sale. Until recently, investors in these sales have not been overly concerned with logistics — mostly because their tokens are liquid and the market has been hot. Many have ridden wave after wave of positive sentiment and cashed out of positions, netting handsome profits at the end of the day. Of course, this is not sustainable — it’s a speculative bubble, and those are always painful when they pop. It will be interesting to see how many of the projects financed within the last 18 months actually come to fruition.

At Kowala, we have chosen to focus on building an extremely intricate financial system that has properties and characteristics with massive real-world effects. It’s hard to overestimate the potential impact of our work. It’s a decentralized replacement for central banks, for goodness sake — a robotic network that can be owned by anyone and controlled by no one, one that can issue currency and control money supply completely in lieu of central oversight. And this robot is already largely built and coming into life. Soon, we will get to witness it’s birth and see what we’ve wrought — it’s simultaneously exciting and terrifying.

Will our team’s focus on delivering world-changing tech give our company a competitive business edge? We certainly hope so, but I think it depends largely on the focus of the marketplace, as we go through the next phase of our development. So far, in the volatile world of crypto mania, our focus hasn’t always resonated with the dominant sentiment. We hope that the mood of the industry will continue to shift our way — towards projects with a focus on delivering consequential technology to the market.

Can you share examples of measures you take to prevent internal data breach?

Regarding preventing internal data breaches: that’s exactly the type of information we should not share publicly due to the increased likelihood of a breach, if we do spill our cybersecurity secrets. I can say that we’ve fended off a number of attacks already, and that we employ the highest-tier of expert security advisors, as well as taking plentiful precautions. In general, I think social engineering hacks represent the greatest threat. So it’s wise to create systems with mechanisms that rely on more than individuals’ trustworthiness and good judgement.

Can you share a story of a time when things went south for you? What kept you going and helped you to overcome those times?

Startups, crypto markets, regulatory uncertainty, developing complex software systems — each of these circumstances come with their own moments of things going south. What keeps us motivated through trying circumstances is our commitment to creating a new kind of money. We have already invented a number of important technologies that we feel confident will make a difference in our industry and world, and these have begun to be recognized by experts beyond our industry. Our team’s experiences overcoming obstacles provides us with the confidence that we can overcome the many more that are probably on the horizon.

We believe we can create an elegant technology that will greatly expand human prosperity and freedom. Our goal — to create the next dominant form of money technology — is audacious and sometimes ridiculous. Even so, we are well on our way.

What are some things that you do on daily basis regardless of how busy you are?

Exercise. Hands down, the most important part of running a company is making sure you are also taking care of yourself. Exercise, eat well, hydrate, sleep — although the latter is something I frequently don’t get enough of.

What are the top 3 upcoming conferences you are attending and are excited about?

I will be speaking at a few upcoming conferences this fall, which I am very excited about.

One I spoke at last month, Health Further, was very exciting. We discussed the future of health care (hence the name), and the impact of blockchain on this space. There were a lot of interesting ideas which came out of that conference and I am thrilled to be a part of this movement.

At the Entreprenuership Summit at W&L on September 21, I spoke on two panels, including “The FinTech Revolution”, discussing how FinTech is changing the landscape of the financial industry, and “Demystifying Blockchain”, simply explaining what blockchain is and how it will change so many parts of our lives.

GoBlockCon in October 2018, I will also be speaking at, and joined by hundreds of blockchain enthusiasts. I am very excited to both discuss and hear about all of the new technologies begin released.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“We want to do what we feel called to do, to always do our best, and to always do what’s right — despite the many obstacles and struggles.”

How can our readers follow you on social media?

We have a multitude of social platforms, but Telegram is probably the best way to stay updated on everything Kowala. Following that, we post to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube quite frequently!

Thank you so much for this. This was very enlightening!
['Yitzi Weiner']
['Finance', 'Technology', 'Bitcoin', 'Cryptocurrency']