WAGMI Ventures Podcast

Temoc Weber & Igor Mandrigin are the Co-Founders of Gateway (https://gateway.fm). Backed by Lemniscap, Unstoppable Domains, & more, Gateway is building the next generation of web3 infrastructure and tooling products—offering RPC, staking, and instant private zk-rollups. In this episode we discuss private rollups and app-chain development, building during the bear market, what keeps them ex...

Julia Zhou is a Partner—Venture & Market-Making at AlphaLab Capital (www.alphalab.capital). AlphaLab Capital Group is a technology-driven trading group that transacts over $2B daily in cryptoassets on 40+ exchanges, both centralized and decentralized. They were one of the first movers in quantitative trading on the blockchain, and today they operate thousands of algorithms 24/7 on a globally d...

Amrit Kumar is the COO at AltLayer (https://www.altlayer.io). Backed by Polychain, Binance Labs, Balaji Srinivasan, & more, AltLayer offers Rollups-as-a-Service products that accelerate web3 projects. In this episode we discuss the original insights that led to the creation of AltLayer, the remarkable traction of their testnet, Amrit’s advice for building and scaling teams, his outlook on the...

Tim Beiko is part of the Protocol Team at the Ethereum Foundation (https://ethereum.org/en/foundation). In this role Tim orchestrates development teams focused on the core protocol—most notably for The Merge. In this episode we discuss Tim’s origin story in crypto, how Ethereum can serve as an economic testnet for new types of coordination in the world (and why that’s a valuable proposition), what...

J.M. Porup is the Chief Information Security Officer of Ava Labs (here in a personal capacity to talk security and web3). In this episode we discuss security differences within web2 vs. web3, how to think about security in web3 as an individual and as an institution, why being a CISO is about risk reduction (not risk elimination), and why security in crypto right now is like “fighting Mike Tyson w...

Foobar is the Founder & CEO of Delegate (https://delegate.xyz). Delegate is all about securing your on-chain identity—enabling you to keep your vaulted NFTs and ERC20s safe by linking wallets together, plus claim airdrops, prove token ownership, and more from your hot wallet. In this episode we talk about unexpected challenges of semi-pseudonymity on the internet, Foobar’s present outlook on t...

Zac Williamson is the Co-Founder and CEO of Aztec ( https://aztec.network ). Backed by Variant, a16z, & more, Aztec is a first-of-its-kind hybrid zkRollup supporting both public and private smart contract execution. In this episode we learn how Zac got into crypto from his past life as an Oxford researcher in particle physics, his perspective on the practical uses of privacy (and the implicati...

Evin McMullen is the Co-Founder and CEO of Disco (https://www.disco.xyz/). Backed by Polychain Capital, Winklevoss Capital, WAGMI Ventures, & more, Disco is your own personal data backpack—where you own yourself, and control what you share. In this episode we hear about Evin’s fascinating educational journey, her formative experiences with Napster early-on, how decentralized identifiers and ve...

Jay Jog is the Co-Founder of Sei Labs (https://www.sei.io/). Backed by Multicoin Capital, Coinbase, WAGMI Ventures, & more, Sei is the fastest Layer 1 blockchain, designed to scale with the industry. In this episode we discuss Jay’s experience at Robinhood (and how it inspired the creation of Sei Labs), how speed unlocks new building possibilities, Sei’s evolution from the “DeFi-focused chain”...

Max Galka is the Founder and CEO of Elementus (https://www.elementus.io/). Backed by Gemini, Lightspeed, & more, Elementus puts the democratization of quality blockchain data at the forefront of everything we do in order to transform industries at web3 scale. In this episode we chat about his tradfi experience during the financial crisis, the quest for enabling quality data at-scale, what’s go...

Antonio Garcia-Martinez is the Founder and CEO of Spindl (https://www.spindl.xyz). Backed by Dragonfly, Chapter One, Balaji Srinivasan, & more, Spindl is creating Web3's first real attribution system—so you can know where your users came from, what they're doing, and why. In this episode we chat about what attribution enables for analytics, communicating the value of marketing to cry...

Max Howell is the Founder and CEO of Tea (https://tea.xyz). Backed by Acuitas Group Holdings, Betaworks Ventures, & more, Tea is unified packaging infrastructure—and through that packaging infrastructure, they have plans of leveraging blockchain to help remunerate devs for their contributions to OSS. In this episode we discuss Max’s illustrious history within the open-source movement as creato...

Sreeram Kannan is the Founder and CEO of EigenLayer ( https://www.eigenlayer.xyz/ ). Backed by Blockchain Capital, Figment Capital, WAGMI Ventures, & more, EigenLayer is the first market for decentralized trust—creating an ecosystem for restaking, which enables staked ETH to be used as cryptoeconomic security for protocols other than Ethereum, in exchange for protocol fees and rewards. In this...

Raj Parekh is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Portal (www.portalhq.io). Backed by Haun Ventures, Chapter One, Slow Ventures, & more, Portal enables you to launch a powerful and secure offering with a single integration for all of Web3 that gives your users direct access to the world of DeFi, NFTs, blockchain-based gaming, and more. In this episode we discuss Raj’s perspective on user experience in...

Michael Hiles is the Founder & CEO of 10XTS (https://10xts.com/). Backed by LOUD Capital, 10XTS builds compliant, programmable digital securities and interoperable web3-powered capital markets infra solutions. In this episode we discuss a law-centric approach for the blockchain industry, the importance of a solid legal regime for global capital markets (and integrating well), the state of cryp...

Timur Csillik (Co-Founder & CEO @ Nabu) and Diederik Kruijssen (Chief Data Officer @ Nabu) join us on today’s episode. Backed by Founders Factory, Nabu (nabu.xyz) is building the most trusted NFT valuation engine, to increase transparency in Web3 and enable the universal adoption of NFTs as an asset class. In this episode we discuss Nabu’s approach of leveraging machine learning and AI to asce...

John Crain is the Co-Founder and CEO of SuperRare Labs (https://superrare.com). Backed by Sound Ventures, Collaborative Fund, and angels like Naval Ravikant and Mark Cuban, SuperRare is an NFT marketplace for curated cryptoart—a new art market for artists, collectors, and curators. In this episode we discuss the fascinating origin of SuperRare, $RARE and their progressive decentralization into a D...

Nick Emmons is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Upshot (https://upshot.xyz). Backed by Polychain and Blockchain Capital, Upshot is building financial infrastructure for NFTs, including industry-leading NFT appraisals and other financial tools that provide deep insight into NFT markets and unlock a wave of new DeFi possibilities. Upshot is currently providing accurate, real-time appraisals for 104M+ NFTs...

Darshan Vaidya is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Credora (http://credora.io). Backed by Paradigm, Coinbase Ventures, WAGMI Ventures, & more, Credora is building infrastructure for institutional credit—with its complete lending platform, counterparty credit ratings, & more. In this episode we discuss the advantages of data-driven lending relative to relationship-driven lending, the early challe...

Ivo Georgiev is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Ambire (https://www.ambire.com/). Backed by LAUNCHub Ventures, MetaCartel Ventures, & more, Ambire is the Web3 wallet that makes self-custody easy and secure for everyone (built on account abstraction). Ambire Wallet is available on mobile and allows registering using email (while keeping full custody). In this episode we discuss the journey from AdEx...

Michael Feng is the Co-Founder @ Hummingbot ( https://hummingbot.org/ ). Backed by Initialized Capital, Slow Ventures, & more, Hummingbot is open source software that helps you build high-frequency crypto trading bots that specialize in market making and arbitrage strategies. They average $100M+ 24H volume, have 1M+ all-time downloads, and support 13+ HFT strategies. In this episode we dive de...

Omar Yehia is the Head of Investments at Matter Labs, creators of zkSync (https://matter-labs.io/). Backed by a16z, Variant, Dragonfly, & more, Matter Labs is scaling Ethereum with zero-knowledge proofs to accelerate public blockchain adoption. In this episode we discuss zkSync’s evolution from testnet to mainnet alpha, the breadth of their ecosystem (and Omar’s opinion on most exciting direct...

Matt Cutler is the Co-Founder & CEO of Blocknative (https://www.blocknative.com/). Backed by Blockchain Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Ryan Sean Adams & David Hoffman, & more, Blocknative is powering the crypto space—building for validators, for dApps, for wallets, and for traders. In this episode we discuss Blocknative’s product evolution (from their beginnings to their now-expansive pro...

Abhinav Gaur is the Founder & COO @ urFeed  (https://urfeed.xyz). urFeed is a social video & streaming platform, co-owned by creators and their community. In this episode we discuss problems with traditional web2 social platforms, why their feed experience is better than the usual algorithmic feeds, migrating users from web2, the road of progressive decentralization, and much more. Recorde...

Bradley Miles is the Co-Founder & CEO of Roll (https://tryroll.com/). Backed by Techstars, Arthur Hayes, Balaji Srinivasan, & more, Roll is enabling a world where the future of social tokens belongs to you. In this episode we discuss Bradley’s background in venture capital, what Roll is building toward (and soon launching!), and the incredible experience they’re designing for users that wi...