Five questions with Julian Wu, Blockchain Advisor

About Julian Wu

Julian Wu is an advisor on blockchain technologies, distributed computing, decentralized Internet and marketing strategies for software startups.

He initially started consulting for the IT industry working with companies such as HP and Microsoft. Julian first became active in the Shanghai blockchain community in 2014, helping companies and projects such as Bitmex, BTCC, Ethereum, Vechain, Augur, and many more to launch and develop.

Five questions with Julian

Q1: How did you get to where you are today?

Sticking with what I believe in, even if I have to spend most of my time on other things. Blockchain and cryptocurrencies are a roller coaster where the lows are much longer and drawn out than the highs. During those times when the market crashed over 90% from their previous high, I had to find other means of income not related to blockchain. I had to balance my time between other work and organizing community blockchain events. In doing so I was able to keep learning, building a personal network, and ultimately apply mature industry practices and personal network into the blockchain space.

Q2: What advice for someone getting into your space? Alternatively, what advice should they ignore? 

Stay agile, keep learning about blockchain by using the tools and platforms. There are new ideas every month so it’s really hard to keep up. Read the whitepapers of the top ten tokens. Then read some more. Get used to reading whitepapers. Even the scammy ones. Don’t overlook things like FOMO3D or SatoshiDICE, even if it blatantly looks like a Ponzi scheme, it’s still free to read about it. Anything that can grow value over time should not be ignored. We are entering a new economic paradigm, where some traditional economic models and principles aren’t applicable. Don’t be afraid to try something, but be agile enough to pivot if it doesn’t work out or adjust as needed.

Q3: What excites you about the future of technology? 

I’m really excited to see symbiotic integration/convergence, where the gap between biology and technology disappears. Wearables are developing really fast, as is AI. We have already shown that we can’t put our phones down. Very soon, smart glasses will bring us mature AR while we talk to our personal AI assistant through our wireless earbuds. Technological Innovation tends to experience parabolic growth, which means major changes in our lifestyles will happen faster and faster, limited only by society’s natural speed of adoption.

Q4: What have you changed your mind about in the last few years? 

Raising money is easy, investors are willing to take risks on new, unproven businesses and strategies. Venture capital has never been more liquid. In 2015-2018, funds were oversubscribed, with record-breaking monster raises and exits. So raising money for your project should be easy right? It was a trap. 2019 was one of the worst years to raise money. The money is still there, but it seems more closed than in previous years.

Q5: What have you learned about building great company culture? 

Use selected success stories to mold the company culture and values. Everyone should be able to talk about those legendary performances, both as something to strive towards, as well as to use when talking to customers, potential partners, or developing new products. Update those stories and cultural practices every 12-18 months as the challenges and needs of the company change.

Extra question: One important truth that few people agree with you on?

Cryptocurrencies and blockchain will play an important role in disrupting dollar hegemony. Lots of people think the US dollar will forever be the global standard currency, or at least for the foreseeable future. I can’t stand that idea. The sooner the disruption the better. My theory is that blockchain will offer economic and governance “off-the-shelf” solutions, allowing any economy or market to perform at minimum standard of efficiency and security. Once we see the rise of markets and economies outside of the antiquated US Petro-dollar regime, we will see the next major jump in the global economy.