In the recent World Blockchain Summit, we met with Cyrus Taghehchian, the Founder of the event. He shared his thoughts about the turn of events and the success of the WBS Dubai this year. He is a firm believer in blockchain and what it can do for the good of the world. Without further ado, here is the interview.
Q. Can you give us a brief introduction of yourself and your projects as well?
My name is Cyrus, I’m grateful to be here. Thanks for having me. I am the CEO of Splyt Core Foundation, a decentralized e-commerce platform that’s going to create a free market for peer-to-peer transactions that happen without any middlemen. My background started at Deloitte Consulting as an e-commerce technology consultant, where I learned a lot about the issues that we face in e-commerce and centralization today. And then I’ve been in the blockchain space since 2014. So I got in kind of early and was happy to be here and answer any questions.
Q. How do you integrate e-commerce with blockchain?
Yeah, so we’ve incorporated a very novel way using NFTs. So before I answer that question, I’m going to give a little primer on web2 and web3, because that’s very important to understand. So web2 was a very beneficial technology for society, it brought social media to us so we can stay connected to our friends and family. It brought the sharing of information like you could Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) anything, and you’ll learn anything from the snap of your fingertips. That wasn’t the case 50 years ago, where all the information was centralized, to a few colleges or universities or libraries. But now everybody can learn anything they want at any given moment, which is great. However, about like, 10 years ago, these central entities who are providing the data and information, they realized that the winning method to monetize their businesses is to mine user data and use that data to exploit users to make them buy things, make them change their behaviors. And that’s very detrimental to the human psyche. So, you know, advertising became the mending method for web2. And that became very harmful because only certain central entities own that data.
Now, web3, which is blockchain-based technology, changes that paradigm. It puts the permission and the control of the data and takes it away from the central entities and puts it into the power of all the users. So it’s decentralizing ownership of data. Right, and they’re changing the monetization method from, hey, let’s mine user data and exploit users with that data, to if a user opts in to give him their data to the ecosystem, then they could get rewarded with tokens, right? So it changes the whole monetization method where it’s more friendly and community-based, and web3 than it is in web2.
Now, in e-commerce like Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), Noon, Alibaba (NYSE:BABA), no matter where you’re in the world, there’s only one or two major players that are eating up all the market share, they could censor users with no recourse, right? That’s an issue. And they’re mining your data and using it against you to make you buy more things, right. So that’s another problem. So the way we’re combating this with web3 is tokenizing products that are for sellers’ NFTs. So if you take real-life products, that you’re trying to sell an iPhone or computer, you tokenize it as an NFT of the data, right? Then you could decentralize the e-commerce supply chain to level the playing field to take all the power away from Amazon, Noon, or Alibaba, and put it in the hands of the community. So we are building the web3 data layer, for global inventory of goods for sale, that anybody could then pick up anybody’s inventory and sell it. So it’s creating this decentralized Amazon mechanism that is enabling peer-to-peer transactions that happen that are fair, transparent, and secure.
We do this by collateralizing, the sale and the listing of the product. So if I want to list something for sale, and you want to buy it for me, you need to trust me, right. And in a peer-to-peer transaction, you don’t know who I am. So I might just take your money and run away. Right? So that’s why we have always had Amazon or Alibaba to act as the middleman to ensure that the buyer and seller transact and what they say they’re going to do.
Now, in our system, when we’re building, we’re collateralizing, the listing of the NFT as with tokens, so you have to put some tokens in, and that’s a good-faith sign from the seller to a buyer saying, Hey, I’m gonna put in 10 tokens or 100 tokens. When the transaction is complete, and I fulfill the order I get those tokens back, right. As a buyer, you’re like, oh, there is collateral against this listing. So if I’m purchasing this item, I’m going to most likely get it because if I don’t get it or something goes wrong, or if the seller is a bad actor, then the seller loses those tokens. So it’s ushering us into a decentralized e-commerce trade era, where you don’t need Amazon, Alibaba, or Noon anymore where you could transact with unknown people across the globe in a fair, secure, transparent way. And that’s what we’re doing with Splyt.
Our token is out, it’s called ShopX, check it out. And we have a very healthy community. We are massively undervalued as a company because most NFTs are talking about art, right? And we’re talking about using NFTs as building the new information highway using data sets to create secure transparent e-commerce.
Q. Where can people find you? Do you have a website? Do you have a booth here? And where can we see you next?
Okay, well, I’m going to be at, you know, Ape Fest in New York. So if you guys are going to be in New York for Ape Fest, which is the Bored Ape Yacht Club, little NFT trade show. I’ll also be at Art Basel in Miami, sometime in November and then I’ll be at the next Trescon event in Singapore. I’ll also be speaking there. I think that’s going to happen sometime in February or March of next year. To find us, please go to splytcore.org.