Blockchain Start-ups: Meet the Founders of Corl

Published in

MLG Blockchain

7 min readJan 29, 2018

MLG Blockchain Consulting is committed to supporting unique and upcoming blockchain companies on their journey towards successfully integrating their technology. And we know many of you are curious to dive deep in the minds behind these novel blockchain startups.

In this Meet The Founder series, we aim to support your learning progression of the blockchain industry by asking insightful questions to the founders themselves! Today, discover the FinTech gurus behind Corl, Derek Manuge & Sam Kawtharani.

How did you first get involved with the blockchain century?

Derek: I first heard about blockchain when trying to understand what Bitcoin was. This was in university, back when I had way too much free much time and spent most of it on the Internet. While I heard about Bitcoin earlier, I didn’t look into the concept until 2013 when my friend Vlad talked to me about it. At first, I somewhat dismissed the idea, but when I took the time to read more about it the profound impact of Bitcoin became clear to me. Scarce programmable money, such as Bitcoin, has more benefits than traditional fiat, yet exhibits all of the essential properties of a currency. Since then I have followed the space from the confines of my corporate office, only to emerge last year to found Corl.

Sam: I first heard about blockchain when a colleague of mine in Denmark joked about using bitcoin in our lending platform when I was Head of Product at IOU Financial. Of course the product fanatic in me rushed to research and understand what bitcoin was and how it could be really used. I definitely didn’t take the market seriously at that point but with time I started noticing how important bitcoin and blockchain is. The decentralization aspect was very appealing to me as I do believe in cutting the middleman out of any process. With time I noticed how the blockchain can improve a lot of the outdated financial processes and help the unbanked get access to proper payments and banking infrastructure. My first attempt of getting involved was by trying to convince my CEO at the time to expand our lending product to utilize bitcoin or blockchain based lending. Since then I have followed the space closely, until we launched Corl last year.

2. What inspired the idea of your ICO, was it spontaneous? Was it an idea you had for a long time?

Derek: I’ve always been passionate about leveraging advanced technologies to enhance efficiency. But in this field, financial institutions are reluctant to move away from their legacy processes because their mentality is reactionary; you don’t fix something that isn’t broken. Most incumbents are familiar with blockchain and have been hiring talent to test out the technology, but the pace of innovation within a multi-billion dollar bank is usually not as fast as that of a multi-million dollar startup. It is up to us, the crypto and FinTech community, to initiate change, and Corl is doing that by offering the equity in our company as a securities token, being one of the first to do so in a regulated manner. On a more personal level, I have been frustrated for a long time with the speed, cost, and lack of accessibility I’ve experienced in my finances. By moving securities to the blockchain, the idea is to remedy the frustrations that are all too familiar to those who deal with their own finances.

Sam: Part of my personality and perhaps my experience as a Product Manager pushed me to question every process and if it can be better. When you look at the FinTech space, most of the innovation evolved on the consumer side and banking financial products. When I quit my job to pursue entrepreneurship within the FinTech space, I noticed how the funding market today is centralized, fragmented, inaccessible to retail investors, and lacks the sufficient capital needed to support the growth of the tech ecosystem. Something had to be done, and being a believer of the blockchain space I teamed up with Derek to change the status-quo. Change happens when dreamers push the boundaries, and that’s what we’re doing at Corl, offering equity in our company as a securities token, a regulatory-compliant one.

3. What did you do before starting Corl? Did you demonstrate prior expertise in blockchain?

Derek: Simply put, I was a “mathematician for hire” with a focus on finance. I operated at the intersection of mathematics, statistics, computer science, engineering, and finance; serially improving financial models and systems in an effort to eliminate inefficiencies and improve objectivity. Despite my hobbyist blockchain experience (reading, developing, and running Ethereum code/nodes), I supported KPMG with their blockchain strategy with a focus on business development. From an academic standpoint, I’ve previously held research roles at the University of Guelph where I conducted research in quantum information theory, game theory, and graph theory, all of which are integral to the foundation of blockchains.

Sam: I think the best way to describe it is to say that I’ve been a blockchain hobbyist, simply following up on the space, attending events and reading about the potential of the technology. While my role as a Head of Product allowed me to have control over the product vision, blockchain and wasn’t part of the company’s strategies. Prior to Corl, I experimented with a small project called Swipe it Fwd that aimed to create a coin for universal donations around the world. Come to think about it, Swipe it Fwd could have been the first ICO, but unfortunately that project never saw daylight.

4. Who is the team behind Corl and why are they awesome?

Sam is our product guy, startup-to-IPO, with a Master’s in Quality Systems Engineering. He also happens to be our CEO. He’s contributed to over $500 million in small business origination, so this is a project that he is really passionate about.

I’m Derek, and I’m the numbers guy with a Master’s degree in Mathematics. I’ve advised over forty financial institutions, governments, and regulators. I’m also an advisor at The BlockchainHub.

5. How did you bring this idea to life? Did you launch an ICO?

It’s been relentless work, coupled with a passionate philosophical belief that the securities and funding industry are ripe for disruption.

We will actually be launching an Initial Token Offering (ITO), which will give equity to token holders, that will be coming soon so make sure to sign up to our whitelist!

6. What problems does Corl plan to solve?

Corl provides royalty financing to high-potential early-revenue companies. Our online platform provides companies with access to competitively-priced, non-dilutive, founder-friendly capital, and streamlines the funding process by analyzing transaction-level financial and social data. Corl is also planning to launch Canada’s first regulated securities token on the blockchain that represents equity in the company and pays dividends on a quarterly basis. Corl will set a precedent in the financial services industry by initiating the evolution towards digitizing financial assets on the blockchain, and changing the way that early-revenue companies obtain funding.

7. Please walk us through the user experience of someone who would use Corl.

The experience will differ depending on if you’re an entrepreneur or an investor, so let me quickly run through both.

Entrepreneurs will be able to fill out applications for funding on the Corl platform. Once reviewed, our team will call you to get to know you and to determine whether your business is a good candidate for revenue-sharing. Once approved, we will send you a term sheet and get you the funding that you need to keep growing your business. This whole process takes less than 2 weeks. In terms of repayment, there will be a fixed percentage of your business’s monthly revenue that will go to reimbursing the investment — this is what we call ‘revenue-sharing’. All of the information regarding your business’s funding will be easily accessible on the Corl platform.

For investors, the process will be a bit different, but just as straight forward. Potential investors will fill out an application on our platform — this will include questions about your financial circumstances as we are compliant with current securities laws. Once approved, investors will be able to send ETH to the Corl smart address from the platform where they will receive CRL tokens in return. These tokens will then be invested in a diversified portfolio of emerging businesses and investors will be able to visualize the value of their ownership, dividend payouts and personal investment performance on the platform.

8. How big is the market you are addressing?

There is currently a $100 billion USD worldwide gap for early-stage company funding. This is the market we are addressing.

9. Who are you current non-blockchain competitors?

Our non-blockchain competitors are alternative financing companies that are not VC, Angels or banks. Each has a slightly different model, but a few of these are SaaS Capital, Lighter Capital, Fleximize.

10. Where is your ICO registered? Which country and what are their current regulations?

We’re registered in Canada. We are working on the securities approval that will allow us to offer the Corl token to investors around the world (except the US, China, etc.).

11. What is your favourite blockchain project (or company) that was created and why? Do you use it yourself?

Derek: Ethereum, Polymath, and 0x. Corl is, or intends to, use all three protocols to bring our company to life. Moving the multi-trillion dollar securities industry to the blockchain depends on the success of these three protocols.

Sam: Ethereum, Polymath, Bloom, and Civic. We are currently using Ethereum and Polymath at Corl. I would like to find a way to adopt Civic’s Identity Verification or Bloom’s blockchain based credit files to our platform one day.

12. If you had the opportunity to meet the mysterious Satoshi Nakatomo, what is the one thing you would want to ask him?

Derek: How are you still alive?

Sam: What’s your username on reddit?