Around The Coin

In this episode, Mike Townsend sits down with Rami Essaid, CEO & Co-Founder of Finmark. Rami is a three-time startup founder and passionate entrepreneur, has been building companies for over a decade. He was the founder and CEO of Distil Networks, acquired by Imperva in 2019, before starting his latest venture Finmark, financial modeling software for startups. At Distil Networks, he saw firsthand how difficult and time-consuming financial modeling can be, and built Finmark, so that anyone, not just finance pros, can easily make and update a financial model without having to spend weeks laboring over complicated spreadsheets.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike Townsend speaks with Arnab Naskar, Co-founder of STOKR, the EU’s pioneering digital marketplace for alternative assets, where smart investors connect with and fund forward-thinking founders. Arnab oversees STOKR’s business strategy and is dedicated to promoting open and decentralized capital markets. He is a regular speaker at major blockchain conferences and webinars in Europe. Coming from a legal background, Arnab has a passion for the intersection of law and tech and has led and contributed to blockchain policy discussions as a member of INATBA, an association focused on advising lawmakers and regulators with regards to their blockchain strategies.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike Townsend speaks with Jack O'Holleran, CEO/Co-Founder Skale. Jack is a veteran entrepreneur with a deep background in machine learning, AI, security, and blockchain. Prior to co-founding SKALE, Jack was a founder at multiple Silicon Valley based enterprise technology companies including IncentAlign, a digital currency platform, and Aktana, the leading Machine Learning Analytics platform for the Life Science Industry. He also held an executive role at Good Technology which was acquired by Motorola for ~$500M and subsequently held executive positions in Motorola. Jack has been actively involved in cryptocurrencies and decentralization as an investor since early 2013 and began working full-time in the space in early 2017. Jack holds a BS from the University of Nebraska and calls the Bay Area his home. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike Townsend sits down with Liran Zelkha, Co-Founder and CTO of Lili, the all-in-one banking app designed for freelance workers. He has over 20 years of tech industry experience, including as a freelancer, which inspired him to create a solution for independent workers’ unique pain points. From strategic management to hands-on coding, Liran specializes in turning lofty ideas into functioning businesses. Prior to founding Lili, Liran served as CTO and VP, Research and Development for Pepper, the first and only challenger bank in Israel. Liran was also CEO and CTO at tech consulting firm Tona and owner / co-CEO of Aluna, Israel’s leading Java and service-oriented architecture (SOA) consulting firm. Liran received bachelor's degrees in computer science from Universitat Ben Gurion Ba-Negav and The Academic College of Tel-Aviv. He is based in Israel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike Townsend speaks with Sohaib Zahid, Chief Executive Officer at Railz. Sohaib is a serial entrepreneur with a decade of successful experience in building teams, products, and companies. He focuses on Sales and Marketing. Prior to founding Railz, Sohaib founded Vanhawks, where he led product, sales, and operations. Vanhawks was acquired in 2016. Originally from Pakistan, Sohaib dropped out of medical school to pursue entrepreneurship and is a strong believer in open access to data. Outside of work, Sohaib enjoys time with his family, and nerds out on air-cooled engines. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike Townsend interviews Tron Black, President of Ravencoin Foundation. Tron is a freedom advocate, crypto developer, entrepreneur, and founder of two startups that were sold to publicly traded companies.  Tron holds a BS in Computer Science and a Master's of Business Administration.  Since early 2013, Tron has been working in the cryptocurrency space as a miner, developer, investor, and trader. He was one of the first five employees of t0 (tZero), and helped issue the first publicly traded SEC acknowledged parallel crypto-equity for Overstock.com, and issued the world's first crypto bond offering. He worked for ANX International, a crypto-fintech company located in Hong Kong. Tron was a Principal Developer for Medici Ventures which invested in a portfolio of blockchain companies including TZero, Bankorus, Bitt, Voatz, Minds, Chainstone Labs, Ripio, SettleMint, Vinsent, and Spera.  Tron has given away crypto-currencies to hundreds of people in order to increase awareness of how value now moves as easily as e-mail. He's written articles about Bitcoin, Monero, Dash, Financial Regulations, Security Tokens (STOs) and Ravencoin, and has been featured on many crypto-currency podcasts. He's the inventor of a number of patents in the crypto space and regularly gives talks on crypto-currency topics worldwide.  Along with serving as the President of the Ravencoin Foundation, Tron is also an advisor to TZero, TUSC, Realio.fund, EquaStart, and supporter of RVN which is both a top cryptocurrency and a leading crypto-asset platform.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike Townsend sits down with Richard Groome, executive chairman, and CEO at ALT 5 Sigma. He leads the firm’s global business and support to clients worldwide including financial institutions, institutional investors, and corporate clients. After 36 successful years in the securities industry, starting two leading securities firms from scratch, completing over 600 financings raising over $4 billion, and sitting on 30+ boards, today Mr. Groome is applying his expertise to grow companies seeking to make a difference in the world. He believes this is achieved through innovation, perseverance, and good governance scaled to a global level.He is a market disrupter across a variety of industries including technology, agriculture, food and beverage, medical and biotech, new mineral discoveries, and electric vehicle metals.His past experience includes: Started two securities trading and underwriting houses from scratch each achieving best in class status within 3 years, one traded publicly on the TSX.Managed and participated in over 600 financings representing some $4 billion of small-cap deals. Several of Mr. Groome’s companies have succeeded in becoming billion and some multi-billion-dollar companies.Past Director of the CDNX, predecessor of the TSX-Venture Exchange.Mr. Groome is known as one of the preeminent financiers in Canada for small and medium-sized emerging growth companies over the last 36 years. His previous firms were sold and taken over by Desjardins and Dundee respectively.Served on over 30 board of directors of junior and mid-sized emerging growth companies; very well versed in corporate governance and early start-up situations.Mr. Groome was born and raised in Montreal. He graduated from McGill University in 1981 with a Bachelor’s in Economics. He keeps very busy with numerous activities including watersports and barefoot skiing. He enjoys reading about innovations, world leaders and economics. He supports charitable causes for underprivileged children, wildlife and natural habitats. He and his wife enjoy traveling and learning about local cultures and traditions. Mr. Groome has been married for 30 years and has two adult children.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike Townsend speaks with Michael Weisz, Co-founder and President of Yieldstreet, the only multi asset alternative investment platform for retail investors. As a seasoned Alternative Investments expert, Michael has created access to investments spanning art, real estate, private business credit, litigation and marine financing, structured notes, and more previously only available to ultra high net worth individuals and institutions. At Yieldstreet, Michael has led the company’s investment strategy and product development as well as the strategic vision of Yieldstreet from inception to 325,000 members on the platform, with more than $2.2B invested and $1B returned to investors in principal and interest. He has held a variety of positions across the specialty finance spectrum including founding Soli Capital and American Medical Concierge. Previously, Michael was Vice President at a New York-based credit opportunities hedge fund with $1.2 billion under management. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In our latest episode, Mike Townsend speaks with Weiwu Zhang, CTO of Smart Token Labs. Zhang has over 9 years of experience in blockchain technology, alt currency design and trading algorithms. He has served as blockchain architect for CBA (largest Australian bank), held the R3 global architect office, and also architected 3 altcoins and 7 ICO projects.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Mike Townsend speaks with Toby Russell, Co-CEO of Shift, the platform to make buying and selling cars simple and accessible to everyone. Previously, he was Managing Vice President of Digital at Capital One, where he led the bank’s consumer technology transformation, including building the mobile capabilities that drive the majority of Capital One’s new customers and interactions. In 2007 Toby co-founded Taxi Magic, the first on-demand mobile transportation booking technology. He also led a $12 billion renewable energy and efficiency investment program for the US Department of Energy and has been a Project Leader at the Boston Consulting Group. He has a Doctorate from Oxford University.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices