Ram Cohen invented torrenting. Now he’s
building a cryptocurrency called Chia that doesn’t waste electricity like
Bitcoin, and top investors are lining up. Chia has just raised a $3.395 million
seed round led by AngelList’s Naval Ravikant and joined by Andreessen Horowitz,
Greylock and more. The money will help the startup build out its Chia coin
powered by proofs of space and time instead of Bitcoin’s energy-sucking proofs
of work, which it plans to launch in Q1 2019.
The killer
feature in crypto: Legitimacy
But that’s
just the start of Chia’s ambitious plan to disrupt Bitcoin. It’s avoiding the
often-abused ICO process that Chia president Ryan Singer says comes with “a lot
of issues with regulatory uncertainty and investor protection.” Instead, it’s
working with its general council and the SEC to do a mini-IPO this summer or
fall through the JOBS Act’s Regulation A+ equity crowdfunding rule. That could
let Chia raise a maximum of $50 million from the public, non-accredited amateur
investors included.
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“People who
buy in an ICO are uncertain of how the company will spend the money and how
they’ll get the things they were promised,” says Singer, who was COO of
cryptocurrency exchange Tradehill and started several other blockchain
companies. “We’re going to operate the company with the transparency and
accountability expected of a public company, which is very different than most
ICOs.”
Chia will do
a pre-mine of its currency but initially retain ownership of 100 percent of the
coins, using the mini-IPO to foster a community of investors. “We’re planning
on issuing a dividend of Chia to
our shareholders in advance of the network launch,” says Singer. “This ensures
we can get it in people’s hands to use on the network without marketing and
selling it as a security or investment opportunity.”
Ye bhi padhna chahiye aapko:
Because the
public offering is capped at $50 million, Chia will use an auction where
investors choose how much they’ll bid for how many shares. It’s similar to the
process Google used to IPO. The more popular it is and higher people bid, the
less equity Chia will have to sell to get the $50 million. Once a clearing
price is locked in, everyone who bid below it will get no shares and their
deposit back, while those who bid over get their shares plus a refund of the
difference between their high bid and actual price.
“This may be
the first fully compliant public offering for a crypto company,” a Chia
spokesperson writes.
The killer
feature in crypto: Legitimacy
After Cohen
invented the torrenting file transfer protocol in 2004 and co-founded a company
around it called BitTorrent, the startup suffered through a decade of mismanagement by other CEOs.
So this time around, he seems determined to keep control, holding the CEO title
himself. Still, Singer the businessman has been the one orchestrating the
fundraises and growing Chia’s team to six, while Cohen works to derisk the
startup’s complex technical roadmap.
“There’s
been a fair amount of pretty deep algorithmic work and that’s been going quite
well, but these are things that have to be taken seriously,” says Cohen, who
makes maddeningly difficult handheld 3D puzzles in his spare time. “You
absolutely must worry on a technical level about all the ways something could
go wrong because building secure distributed databases is hard.” It’s quite a
statement from a guy who built the protocol BitTorrent said at one point moved
40 percent of world’s internet traffic per day. Chia is now aggressively hiring
engineers with experience in decentralized network protocols, math and
cryptography. Those interested can contact the company at hello@chia.net.
They’ll be
working on an alternative to Bitcoin’s proofs of work, which require CPUs and
GPUs that drain huge amounts of electricity in order to verify the blockchain.
This has led to massive Bitcoin mining pools that split the proceeds while
operating near cheap electricity sources and cold air to cool the mining rigs,
like in the Pacific Northwest. These centralized teams of miners threaten to
allow manipulation of Bitcoin’s price and network.
Chia ditched
proofs of work for proofs relying on file storage space that people often have
sitting around unused on their computers and can use for free. Chia layers on
proofs of time that thwart a range of attacks on proofs of space. It’s also
building in “non-outsourceability” that prevents mining pools from forming.
Essentially, anyone in a Chia mining pool could secretly run off with the
rewards without sharing them, so no one will want to trust their fellow miners
not to rip them off.
Cohen
believes these features of Chia will fix both the electricity waste and
centralization of Bitcoin.
“Do you have
a white paper?” he says people ask, referring to the often vague, theoretical
and unverified claims the blockchain companies make about their technology. “We
have actual papers in refereed journals,” Cohen laughs. Chia
had a peer-reviewed article published in the 38-years-running
cryptography conference AsiaCrypt’s journal.
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The
regulated public offering, the scientific rigor and the seed round joined
by True Ventures, Danhuacap, DCM and Ravikant’s MetaStable crypto hedge
fund are all part of a campaign to establish Chia as more reputable than the
rest of the blockchain industry. “It’s important to us to be seen by the marketplace
as a real investment and not just a pump and dump, hence us going for more
institutional investors that aren’t trying to flip their positions as soon as
they become liquid,” Cohen explains.
The
cryptocurrency space has been dominated by bold claims, weak follow-through,
limited utility and plenty of scams. That’s poisoned the well, souring the
public and inviting government regulation. Chia has a lot to live up to. Even
if the technology works, beating the network effect of other cryptocurrencies
and getting enough Chia owners so it actually becomes useful will be tough. But
with a solid team, set of investors and plan, Chia could prove the blockchain’s
worth beyond Bitcoin.
Energy-saving Bitcoin rival Chia raises from A16Z, plans mini-IPO
Reviewed by Anand Yadav
on
March 28, 2018
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