Meet Iomob co-founder and CTO Josep Sanjuas: the Blockchain Purist
Josep Sanjuas is Co-Founder and CTO of iomob.net. Josep has a Ph.D. in Computer Science. Before joining iomob, he co-founded and was CEO and CTO of startup Talaia, a spinoff of UPC-BarcelonaTech that applies big data & SaaS to Internet traffic analysis.
Why did you found iomob?
I became interested in changing the urban mobility landscape when I saw that taxi drivers in Barcelona were juggling many taxi hailing apps at once. This didn’t make sense to me from a purely technical perspective, and then I realized that the same thing was also happening on the customer side. When trying to rent a shared bike to get home from work, I had to check several apps to see what was available around me each time.
A good weapon for entrepreneurs to identify worthy opportunities is to understand when a situation “does not make sense” or is to an extent counter-intuitive, even from a naive perspective. It’s obvious with hindsight, but these moments made me realize just how fragmented mobility was as a network, and I thought: it does not have to be like this!
So, there was a massive, unsolved problem right there. At the same time, I also realized that blockchain technologies, which I am very passionate about, could help to solve the issue. So it was a no brainer for me to dive in head first and build iomob.
Why was blockchain the solution of choice?
Solving the fragmentation problem in mobility requires building a sort of aggregator of mobility services that unites all providers in a single infrastructure, so they can be discovered, combined, accessed and paid for by end users with a seamless experience.
The traditional approach would be to build our own walled garden with a private, siloed app. Then, try to grow our user base with aggressive marketing, recruit mobility providers with revenue sharing agreements, and so on. The problem is that this approach introduces a glorified intermediary than can capture excessive value from the market, over-charing its users and underpaying providers once it reaches critical mass.
The way to achieve this aggregation effect without introducing a rent-seeker is to merge them under a neutral infrastructure. And technically, this infrastructure can be built using blockchain technology.
How did you get into blockchain?
I still remember the day I learned about bitcoin. It was via a slashdot post announcing bitcoin had reached US dollar parity, that is, 1 BTC = US$1. The concept was extremely intriguing: how does one implement electronic money that does not depend on a central authority?
I read Satoshi’s Bitcoin paper. Due to the research I had been doing to get my PhD I had already been exposed to hashcash, one of its main building blocks. I was convinced Bitcoin could work. Back then I never quite expected, though, I would end up co-founding a project in the blockchain space.
What motivates you in your work with iomob?
I like “building things” — that’s why I have always liked programming. It’s amazing what you can achieve with a few lines of code: you only need to tell computers how to do the heavy lifting for you. Building software is part science, part art, part magic.
Building software is part science, part art, part magic.
This is also why I love startups. I founded one before iomob called Talaia. In a startup, there’s so much going on that it’s impossible to get bored: you get to build things or die trying. It’s intense. I have found that I feel more fulfilled when I am emotionally invested in my work.
Iomob feels like an incredible opportunity to build a “thing” that could end up being used by a mind-boggling amount of people. To me, that’s very alluring.
What is your vision for iomob?
Above all, I want iomob to deliver a technical solution that people use. I’d rather avoid grandiloquent goals. For me, success is defined in degrees.
Many startups fold before releasing anything worthy of actual use, so I am very much looking forward to the first mobility service that iomob facilitates in a production setting.
From there, I would like to see independent teams running various parts on the infrastructure. Success for me would be seeing so many independent teams building upon iomob that I can no longer keep track of them.
Success for me would be seeing so many independent teams building upon iomob that I can no longer keep track of them.
What do you think about the term ‘smart city’ and do you see it remaining a popular term in the future?
What to say? I’m not a big fan of loosely defined terms like smart cities, IoT, or even, for that matter, our very own “Internet of Mobility” buzzword. Increasingly, even “blockchain” is used as a buzzword that is devoid of meaning in some contexts. I leave that terrain to marketers and those seeking to inspire others to follow their agendas.
The smart cities community is working hard on the most pressing urban challenges we face.
If I had to take a guess, I would say that eventually someone will end up replacing “smart cities” with another buzzword that best suits their narrative. This does not mean that the problems being worked on under the umbrella of the smart city movement are not real nor important. On the contrary. The smart cities community is working hard on the most pressing urban challenges we face.
What do you think is the future of blockchain in general and for urban transit in particular?
Blockchain tech still needs to improve in order to be ready for some of the applications that people want to use it for.
Scalability is the most pressing issue at the moment. In my view, it’s quite close to being solved, but no blockchain is there as of yet. What we currently have are solutions that scale by removing decentralization and security to varying degrees. Massive scalability should also solve a related problem: currently, transaction costs in public blockchains are “too damn high”.
The second most important issue is that — with a few exceptions — individuals and organizations are not prepared to manage crypto-assets.
So much brain-power is being invested in blockchain tech (and the vested financial interests are so significant) that I expect problems will be resolved gradually and, eventually, we will all end up using tech products or services without necessarily being aware they are blockchain-based.
Eventually we will all end up using tech products or services without necessarily being aware they are blockchain-based.
In terms of urban transit specifically, I hope that we manage to prevent wannabe monopolies from achieving their goal of monopolizing the market. I want independent taxi drivers to stay in business, even if they end up operating autonomous vehicles instead of driving them. I want small startups to be able to innovate without having to compete with a behemoth, or having to pay intermediaries like Ubers or Lyfts — or Googles or Amazons for that matter — a tax to participate in their proprietary marketplaces.
I want independent taxi drivers to stay in business. I want small startups to be able to innovate without having to compete with a behemoth or having to pay intermediaries a tax to participate in their proprietary marketplaces.
Our economic systems fail very hard when monopolies form and middlemen start sucking money without providing much value. I hope iomob is instrumental in building a future where mobility stays as decentralized as it is, but not fragmented as it is now, with shared mobility and public transportation at the centre of a sustainable mobility ecosystem. I want mobility to stay decentralized, but not fragmented — that is the part that needs fixing.
I want mobility to stay decentralized, but not fragmented — that is the part that needs fixing.
Who were your early mentors and inspirations?
I try to be grateful and remember just how lucky I have been. I had the good fortune of being born into a supportive family that cared for their kids, were role models, fostered my creativity and ingenuity, and were well off enough that we did not struggle to fulfil any basic needs.
I have also had excellent teachers throughout my education, and great friends who have helped me to develop a critical spirit.
I could not name one single source of inspiration. I like to think I constantly challenge my beliefs to try to further my understanding of the world. When you have that mindset, anyone can teach you valuable lessons. I’m sounding pretentious now, so enough of that!
What currently inspires you in life and work?
It is hard not to be inspired by all the people who are working or have worked on basic blockchain technology. It’s quite cliché by now, but some names would be: Satoshi Nakamoto, Gavin Andresen, Vitalik Buterin, Gavin Wood and the likes.
A great motivation for me is the desire to understand stuff to a point where my degree of ignorance does not bug me anymore. Right now, it’s blockchain tech, cryptoeconomics, and mobility.
What was the best advice anyone ever gave you, and did you follow it?
“Do not follow any piece of advice, not even this one.” Joking — I couldn’t find one. I tend to ignore advice and end up having to learn the lessons myself. Sometimes I just can’t take someone’s word for it.
iomob is working to decentralize and build the Internet of Mobility, by incentivizing and facilitating the use of alternative transport. By using the blockchain, iomob plans to minimize fees and allow mobility providers and end-users alike to connect on a peer-to-peer basis. In their own words: iomob is “a system which produces a useful output at the lowest possible marginal cost.”
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