Year in Review: Topl Update
By: Chris Georgen
Tags: Impact Investing, Lessons Learned, Social Impact, Entrepreneurship, Year In Review

While the exact date marking the end of one year and the beginning of another varies across culture and across history (March 1st marked the beginning of the year for the early Roman Republic), I have to imagine that this time has always marked a period of self-reflection and evaluation. In this spirit, here are my thoughts on Topl 2018.

A Busy Year

After wrapping up a very successful trip to Colombia the month before, January 2018 kicked off with us signing an investment agreement with one of the top 3 accelerators in Germany, Iconiq Lab.

Chris speaking at the 100K Blockchain Challenge at South by Southwest 2018

Austin, Texas

In March, Topl pitched at South by Southwest (SXSW) against 5 other amazing blockchain startups, earning the runner-up spot as well as an invitation to become a part of Capital Factory’s family of startups. Happily accepting this opportunity, we moved our newly expanded engineering team to the heart of Austin’s booming startup scene in the summer.

New Partnerships in the Works

While our engineering team was hard at work in Austin, Kim and I spent some time in South Africa over the summer, speaking at various events. We secured the interest of a major diamond miner, who will be leveraging our blockchain in order to bring transparency and honesty to their industry.

Chris (in the pink) at the Impact 2030 Conference

Peacebuilding & the UN

In September, I was invited to speak at the UN Headquarters in NYC at the Impact 2030 Conference about how innovative technologies can be used for peacebuilding.

Setting up in Holland

Although it was back in 2017 that Topl first traveled to the Netherlands, this fall is when we really started to put down roots. Our Foundation was officially formed as a “Stichting” (Dutch for “foundation”), and we moved into our new office in the border city of Maastricht. Clearly our presence in the Netherlands is starting to pay dividends as we were lucky enough to be included in Deloitte’s report on the blockchain ecosystem in Holland.

Going Live

Finally, in December, Dutch NGO FairFood became the first of Topl’s 8 committed launch users to go live, tracking and certifying nutmeg from rural Indonesia into European grocery stores.

Biggest Lessons and Moving Forward

While 2018 saw us add 7 members to our team, develop from a barely functional prototype to soft commercial launch, and appear in Forbes articles 3 days in a row, it was not without it’s struggles and lessons. Here are a few of the more important things that I in particular was lucky enough to learn:

Hofstadter’s Law definitely applies to fundraising. “It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter’s Law.” If they have never felt the pain of the problem you’re solving, it doesn’t matter to people how great your solution might be. Appreciating someone isn’t enough, you need to consistently prove it to them with your words and actions. We’re all insecure sometimes, people’s desire to be appreciated is something I think every leader needs to remember.

Overall, 2018 was an amazing year; I am certain that 2019 will bring Topl similar growth and progress.

Be sure to follow us on social media (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter) for more immediate updates on all our good fortune in the coming year.

And if you want to learn more about our our blockchain head over to GitHub.

Happy 2019!