Michael Luckhoo and Daniel Bland on Cirus Foundation’s hardware devices

0:02i'm ashton addison from block west capital for investment pitch media and the crypto coin show and today on blockchain interviews we have michael luck who and daniel bland co-founders of cirrus network and cirrus foundation gentlemen thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show it's a pleasure to have you here today great thanks ashton nice to meet you

0:21thank you it's great to work with you again definitely michael thank you for coming back daniel great to meet you have you on the show i would love to kick it off uh with a little bit of information on you and your team and an overview of of cirrus foundation and some of the solutions that you're providing well thanks ashton and actually i'm here today in reno nevada and i've got a

0:45little exclusive for you uh i'm here at gil emilio's home gil is a former uh ceo of apple computer uh one of the longest tenured directors at t and uh gil has agreed to join us as a senior advisor uh we'll be announcing that officially on monday so you're getting a little bit of an inside scoop here and uh gil as you know uh one of the titans of silicon valley

1:08uh brings a lot of credibility to blockchain now and obviously the cirrus foundation we're very excited about what syria's foundation is all about and you know to sort of give you the the very short version of what serious is all about we're all about empowering the ownership economy and so what does that mean specifically in our case that means giving you the owner of the data uh

1:29ownership and actual paying you for that data the big data industry is a trillion dollar industry it's running leaps and bounds growing great but what they left out they left out the guy who actually owns the data and that just doesn't make sense so our entire thesis is to change that to do that's tricky uh takes a lot of work uh and the most exciting part about that

1:52we really utilize blockchain technology to do that and so that's really why we come to blockchain it's actually an organic uh fit for what we're trying to accomplish definitely and thank you so much for that uh intro and congratulations on that advisory position thank you that sounds like a great staple um yeah and and you're right about the privacy data management it's been a huge

2:16topic recently especially uh with you know social media and people understanding like hey we're people are sort of becoming the product and they don't really own their own information and with the help of blockchain technology we can we can take that back and i was looking into i was looking into cirrus foundation and that your team actually has hardware uh that that

2:37you're using is not just a software product maybe you can touch on the hardware and sort of what that does and how that brings power back to the users yeah certainly i can touch on that and and exactly what you said action um just to to cover your note there the last year we've seen such a big move in into the digital era and we've left uh you know an informational age to a digital

3:00age where we're now utilizing everything by the form of of data and digital uh version of ourselves so it's more important now than ever before to really empower people to connect with their data because it's not just a uh a value equation it's a representation of themselves in this in news landscape that we're living in and uh that's why with the search foundation

3:20we're building the the inroads into crypto uh decentralized finance and other applications that people can take their data into and it's a very powerful thing this is why we really want to uh focus on this at this point in time um the hardware device is something is very um unique because there's not many crypto projects that are in the space of hardware um you can look at some

3:41comparisons such as like helium uh that's gain some traction which is uh which is fantastic and they're they're showing real use cases uh we take a hardware approach because um it's something that actually doesn't have to change learned behavior right and this is really core to our thesis in the cirrus foundation that we can do something that is most familiar to

3:59people uh they don't have to re you know learn a new system uh what we do is we actually replace a wi-fi router in someone's home and we can connect with them directly and so they can have a very seamless easy on-ramp experience uh that allows the user to come into the system in a more frictionless way but it also connects to their high quality uh data points around their home because we

4:20think in the industry of iot devices that's growing by leaps and bounds uh this is high quality data that's that's inside someone's home that we're actually able to connect with them with and uh part of the hardware solution is that uh it is part of our adoption strategy and when we think about adoption we'll talk about this i think in this call here it's

4:39really really key to what we need to do in the blockchain world to form uh adoption of crypto across the world and the part of our strategy is working with hardware devices is working with major internet service providers across the world to deploy these and so we're really excited about it that is very exciting and i think it's great i think it's great to

5:01merge uh you know that digital world and cryptocurrency and especially people that are just getting into it they they feel like they need to hold something in their hands right um and when they see it's only digital it's they don't really understand uh the connection so to have that piece of hardware i think is is great and yeah there aren't a lot of blockchain

5:20companies that are producing physical hardware but the ones that are they seem like they're they're rapidly selling out and with that you know your team also has to produce that hardware and get it delivered to the customers so i'm curious is it absolutely required to take advantage of the benefits of i know data management personal privacy uh for sears

5:43foundation to have the hardware or is it also possible to take advantage of it without the hardware well you bring up a very good question and we've worked really hard to try to solve that question and answer that question and really cirrus is more than a hardware hardware is obviously a very important part of what we do but bottom line we're an ecosystem we're a platform

6:07and so we can allow for the crypto users immediately within the next very short period of time we'll be announcing that but they can come on and on board onto our platform onto the ecosystems start earning tokens start building value we can get you monetization for your data with just a software solution clearly the hardware is is the the final piece and when we have the iot devices

6:32connected with the wi-fi router and put that in your home it completes the entire process but in the meantime you can start getting onto the platform start learning uh start understanding the benefits of data monetization and uh so yeah that's a big part of our strategy going forward uh to really empower the crypto community and a lot of times as from an entrepreneurial standpoint

6:57you're trying to build uh awareness and you're trying to build adoption and and it's really important that you do that um in our case uh we believe that we have an entire crypto community out there that understand the thesis of empowering the individual taking away from as i like to call them the oligarchs if data is the new oil then the oligarchs are the ones that are

7:20controlling all that now and we think that's flawed and so this is really uh in our minds uh sympatico with foundation's thesis as well as someone that has adopted the cryptocurrency mantra around the world definitely well said daniel and i like how you mentioned data monetization and i know it's one thing to be able to own your data but to be able to actually create revenue

7:48generating opportunities from your own information and be the one who's benefiting from that obviously that's going to have a huge advantages for people to be able to take advantage of that and i know that part of cirrus foundation's goals is to generate revenue generating opportunities for people that have their data they're ready to monetize it maybe you can elaborate on

8:10that and how exactly people can use cirrus to generate revenue from their information yeah i could say it um you know we have we have a two-prong approach making sure that right from the unbox experience you know getting the hardware in your home it's delivered from the internet service provider uh and they install and connect that in the homeowner uh it's it

8:36actually helps us because uh the idea is that we don't have to change the way we instruct people how to use this product it's actually it's it's enterprise uh ready uh the individual then unbox it scan a qr code and they go through an onboarding experience and that on important experience means they opt in for everything they have uh provisions around what they want to share what they

8:54don't want to share full control is is our key and the idea is once they deploy that um device with onboarding experience they've now opened a crypto wallet and so which is really key because this is this is something that really mixes the the uh bridge that we're trying to see right now in crypto where we're inviting the rest of the world to be a part of this digital

9:15era and by us doing that we're inserting blockchain technology without changing people's uh behavior right and so the onboarding experience is really key so they earn revenue right from day one uh they get paid with a cryptocurrency and so now they're inside the system of of what we called uh blockchain and crypto so they can choose how they want to move that value and

9:35that's important for us because now they can reinsert that back into the ecosystem they can take that into network functionalities they can take them to staking uh there's a whole host of web uh three and d5 applications that we're building as a entry point for people so we think that big data is actually the big ticket in uh in in the digital era and that's what we're

9:53leveraging because it's not just an asset that people have to make money but it's an access for them and and that's what's really key and i think the emerging market this is probably one of the first digital currencies that they'll actually uh that they'll actually own um and so it's exciting that is very exciting and uh to open the box and you know be able to understand

10:12that you can be monetizing right away with all of these different avenues as well and know your team is early on and you're continuing to grow out more services more avenues to be able to monetize um it is very exciting and as you continue to grow i was looking sort of at the road map there's many different avenues in ways that you can monetize information and and provide

10:36information to advertisers for example uh to be able to reap the benefits and and not be the product maybe you can talk about you know out of all the ways that you're looking at building currently but also in the future what are you most excited for in ways that uh people through sears foundation can monetize their information well i think the the the core

11:00is understanding that you should be being paid for your data today and you're not being paid for your data so so that's the the biggest part of this equation is just unlocking what is already there and and that's significant and so when we start with that premise it's significant but then we look at all kinds of other avenues that were we're building and thinking about and

11:27working on uh data nft for example it's very interesting uh we think nft you know by and large you know is is not right we think there's some fixes to nfp frankly uh too deep for us to get into that now this is not really a time to do that but uh suffice it to say that the the core the core premise of re-configuring how you're paid for your data that you actually be paid for your

11:54data using blockchain using the serious foundation platform that's kind of the main thing we'll work on other things we'll we're we've got a lot of stuff right now in stealth and in sandboxing and you know it's too early to talk about that because you know there's a lot of things discovered that we have to do we've been two and a half three years just getting to this point so uh stay

12:14tuned uh certainly something that uh you know we'll we'll keep you coming back right yeah and if i can if i can add a point to that too i think that's uh it's very well said i mean the idea is that data is something you should be earning from day one but the amazing part is that we can take an emerging market and create uh data is not just a it's a bankable

12:33asset right and and when they're built on this platform that we're building out right now as daniel kind of alluded to it's it's going to be more of an immersive experience right you can take that data and become a part of the investment world it's it's financial inclusion to the emerging market and that's really key and that's what we want to support

12:51great there's revenue generation but the idea is inclusion in the finance world and and we can do that uh we can we can allow the the owner of that data to use how they want to insert that value into this ecosystem uh data nft is something that we are working on it's a dynamic nft and that allows an individual to uh move their value into other ecosystems which they never had

13:14the ability to do uh before which is so it's a really powerful thing but uh i'm really excited that we actually can take someone who has never had access uh to finance and and give them that and actually include them in the rest of the world where uh we they we just take that for uh for granted yeah definitely that's very excited exciting and i will look forward to

13:34seeing how that plays out i know your team's working on that and a bunch of other things and one of the things that i just saw that your team uh actually did announce which is pretty cool is the integration into polygons network which is the fastest growing blockchain right now so congratulations on that maybe you can talk a little bit about that partnership how it's going to

13:54benefit cirrus foundation and the users yeah certainly when we think about technology and this has been you know over two and a half year experience right now with uh with cirrus and the build out of of this system and especially the device we look for leaders in each industry that we work with they don't have to recreate the wheel we know ethereum is proven it's

14:15tried it's tested and it's here to stay and we could see a lot of advancements in the ethereum community and now that the layer two solutions have come out to support scalability it's made it a perfect fit for us and the idea that we can remit now through the system uh data earnings and data revenue at micro transaction costs micro fees uh it's a perfect fit so we wanted to work with

14:35the best uh we think that the polygon team is very sharp at what they do but they also have an ecosystem play and the first thesis that we want to build here is a network network layer first it's part of the ownership economy so the idea is you can we can support the network layer first we can create nodes validators uh staking tools and we can work with all the ecosystem uh

14:55participants under ethereum later too and so work with polygon invites that crowd in so we can build a ground up approach the network layer first and then the application layer that will sit on top of that which is the data revenue app so the idea for us is uh is is value at every layer and uh why not start with one that we think is is the lead and and

15:15we're excited to work with polygon and they've invited us we have a lot of announcements actually coming out post launch with uh ecosystem players in the theorem layer 2 standard very cool thanks for that michael and you're mentioning you know we keep talking about revenue generating opportunities um and microtransactions as well and i'm i can only help but

15:34think that the cirrus network token is involved in that and we haven't really touched on it yet and i would love to uh get you know more information for the viewers about uh the cirrus token is that sort of the main revenue generation transactional uh you know token that's being used how else is it used in the platform and maybe you know a little bit about the sustainability of

15:57it in the ecosystem yeah certainly i could touch upon on that because it's a very complex uh token economy you've built for the cirrus token um we looked at it from a few functions uh obviously the true utility uh the dynamic within the ecosystem and the and the economy so what i mean by this is that the first functions of the utility token is that every device that lives on the network

16:20will require a nominal amount of cirrus tokens uh that shows that it's live to the network it's an anti-spam type of mechanism making sure that this is a real true homeowner um we also have um the bridge function so we can actually bridge uh individual uh remittance into other currencies stable currencies and and non-native assets uh we also have a uh

16:42remittance function which i said will be a natural aspect because we're paying for data and the the last function as well is rewards especially considering that you could be a network participant in supporting the infrastructure and so we really wanted to look at that the point that i really want to make is that the demand function to the token is what's

17:01key because the more devices that we deploy the more requirement for the for the for the token that will exist and that will be taken either from open market or from a treasury so our idea is to support the innovation of growth uh to the uh token economy by us performing and and we have now um you know a pretty heavy uh uh contract in front of us that is really exciting and

17:24we think there's gonna be a lot of demand for uh for the utility of the token um the the last point to the idea about this is that the user can re-insert that value and earn higher revenue on their data in the future so the more they participate in you know taking the service token and putting it back into value and being part of the network they will increase their multiple uh

17:46from a 1.0 to 1.5 and 2.0 in the future data revenue so they become more of a data value data generator and and that's something that's part of the economy that we're building right now it gives us more of a cutting edge um in in ways we can bring values for the homeowner um and uh you know like i think we could talk about even the adoption strategy as

18:06well because we want to have a wide circulation for the serous token and make sure it's adopted around the world um and i think um uh that's part of our strategy and i think daniel can touch on the the adoption factor as well definitely yeah maybe daniel you could talk about you know with the token uh in the ecosystem when it's out uh what are some of the incentives and

18:29strategies that you're looking to bring on early adopters into the platform yeah and that's really the core again of the juris foundation uh we come to this from the perspective of building a big data platform so our whole idea first comes from a straight big data platform business so how do you do that well there's a lot of ways you can do that snapchat's a good example snapchat

18:55you know they went out public at the 40 billion dollar evaluation they had 125 million users very good very good the negative to that is they lost 700 million dollars that's a big loss and great for the investor they got their roi out of it but we look at it from a standpoint saying well we don't want to spend 700 million dollars to build the platform so how do

19:15we do that so our first strategy was working with emerging markets isps why because you may be shocked to know that emerging markets are still very very few network connections in those markets so broadband connections in emerging markets is very very small and so in these emerging markets isps are expanding very fast we are aligning with those and contracting with those isps

19:45provide large numbers of routers in fact we'll be announcing uh post-launch significant size contracts in the millions which will bring millions and millions of users onto our platform guaranteed not aspirational not if we can get them or convince them because the isp installs the router there's five users for home for that router so we have every contract that we have we have

20:08five users baked into our model coming into crypto the very first time but also coming onto the sears platform for the very first time so that's the hardware strategy but beyond the hardware strategy when we go when we talk about the direct onboarding onto our platform uh with the crypto community before they get a hardware device we are designing incentive structures

20:30that will incentivize those coming onto the platform to get others to get onto the platform uh listen you cannot make an argument that every person that is online shouldn't be on the serious platform it's inconceivable that if you're online you should be being paid for your internet insights it's just automatic that's just like that's a that's a almost a god-given right you should be

20:56doing that and that's not happening so our market is virtually everyone that's on the internet which is a which is a big market so we want to get as many people as possible incentivize to drive adoption get people onto our platform both through hardware and through incentivization uh on the direct to ecosystem onboarding definitely thanks for that daniel and i

21:18i do agree as well and we don't have a lot of time left but i want to talk about the upcoming launch i know there's an ido launch coming up and how mo viewers can learn more about that and also about the hardware and getting involved in sears foundation yeah i'll touch on the um you know the first strategy is that uh we're coming in to mark with uh with we returning a

21:41purpose-built launch uh we're not just uh picking partners and um you know for no reason we we actually will be working with these partners in the long term uh so we are the flagship uh project on uh scale swap right now and that's the ethereum layer two ido launch pad uh we'll be working with those t the team uh go ongoing as well on some innovation

22:02that they've created which is fantastic um we also will be on zendit uh and they have been supporting polygon and d5 integrations uh and then we have a major uh news with some exchanges um and that's all aligns with what we want to do uh to support um uh a purpose-built launch and so that's coming up in the next week uh the main point is that um this is a long-term approach for us and

22:25everybody we try to work with uh is is a part of that a journey the aspects that we have coming up in the next six months um are that once we get to market we'll be opening up our first early access for the crs platform at which you can come in and you can be a an early participant that will allow you to earn serious tokens and be part of the testing trial of data monetization right

22:48from a web client that will actually bolt onto the system and platform and the more you do that the ability for you to even just earn a device for free is something that we're working on and that'll get stripped right to your home uh like daniel said our major focus is working with a enterprise go to market strategy which is isps first because that's how we build in millions of

23:08people into the system but we'll be opening up a direct consumer line uh later part of this year that will allow anybody around the world to be invited to work with us and that will be a premium device that will be able to mine the uh blockchain as well which is super cool it's uh comparison um to to helium and we think that uh probably even a bit better because we

23:28have a real revenue model which is data that's tied on top of it um so we'll allow a premium version and direct to consumer line to access that uh that unit and uh we're we're kind of targeting um you know really multiple approaches so that's really what's had in store in the next six months and uh super excited so very exciting thank you so much michael

23:49and daniel as well for all the great information i will leave those links uh for cirrus foundation uh the upcoming launch all in the description box below as well for the viewers all the best with the launch and all these amazing updates coming in the coming months and let's follow up in the near future thank you so much really appreciate your time