Blockchain Start-ups: Meet the Founder of TRON
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 visionary behind TRON — Justin Sun, the former Greater China chief representative of Ripple.
- How did you first get involved with the blockchain century?
My very first interaction with crypto community was when I made my first Bitcoin purchase back in 2012. But it wasn’t until 2013 that I became more intimately involved with blockchain; that was when I joined the team at Ripple. While I was with them, I worked as the chief representative of Greater China, so I had the opportunity to become a part of blockchain community in China. And then, I went on to found TRON just a few years later!
- What inspired the idea of your blockchain startup, was it spontaneous? Was it an idea you had for a long time?
In the past few years, I’ve been deeply involved in the tech industry and during this time, I began to feel that the internet today didn’t represent what was originally intended when it was created. It was meant to be a decentralized platform, but somehow, it is run by a few big corporations and that didn’t sit right with me.
So, when I became more involved with blockchain, I quickly began to see the effect that this technology could have on reshaping the internet in a way that brings it closer to the original intention of decentralization. Blockchain goes against the idea that power has to be held by just a few big corporation; rather, it allows for power to be shared and for users to have the final word over the content they read and how information is distributed.
The idea for TRON was born out of these belief that I had about the internet and out of the desire to fix it. TRON is our attempt to heal the internet by working towards creating a truly decentralized internet.
2. What did you do before starting TRON? Did you demonstrate prior expertise in blockchain?
Right before founding TRON I was working on a project that I founded called Peiwo. It’s an app that matches and connects users by analyzing 10-second voice samples and interests. It basically allows users to make like-minded friends with online activities. Today, Peiwo is one of the largest audio-based live show platforms in China with over 10 million registered users and approximately 1 million active users monthly.
But, I’ve been involved in the cyrpto community since I made my first Bitcoin purchase in 2012, a bit before joining Ripple in 2013. While founding Peiwo, I was also Ripple’s Greater China Chief Representative. During my time there we completed a successful first-round of financing that totaled $30 million, which allowed us to become one of the top three virtual currencies. So, it was also a great opportunity for me to learn more about blockchain and crypto, which led me to where I am today.
3. Who is the team behind TRON and why are they awesome?
We have quite a big team working on the project. I’ll highlight a few here but if you want to get to know us better, feel free to check us out on our website.
Let’s start with Lucien Chen who is our CTO and Big Data expert. Before joining the team at TRON, Lucien worked at Tencent and Alibaba. Today, he is our technical leader who is responsible for the main chain development of TRON. Lucien also coordinates with TRON’s global technical team and arranges all project developments and schedules. Let’s just say he is great at getting things done.
We also have incredible developers working on this project. Our two newest developers, Maorong Lin and Xiaodong Xie, will be in charge of building the infrastructure for TRON and related coding. They work closely with Lucien to make sure all part of the project align.
We owe a lot to our supporters, as well. We have over 300,000 TRX holders who create an amazing international community that really drives us to produce the best possible project for them. It’s pretty encouraging to know that we have people rooting for us from every corner or the world!
4. How did you bring this idea to life? Did you launch an ICO?
Yes, we did launch an ICO in which ended in September. The support that we received was just amazing — we raised about $70 million. And since then, we’ve also managed to become the first smart contract blockchain protocol to have over 10 million wallet users in the world. So things are happening quickly!
5. What problem does your blockchain plans to solve? How does Tron solve that problem?
As I mentioned a bit early, TRON is our attempt to heal the internet by working towards true decentralization.
We’re solving that problem through a protocol that aims to create a worldwide free content entertainment system with distributed storage technology. With this protocol, users will be able to freely publish, store and own data.
This platform will be based on peer-to-peer interaction between producers of digital entertainment content and users, therefore, circumventing centralized large corporations that hold all of the power in this industry. The content creators will be empowered through the free creation, circulation, and trading of digital assets under decentralized self-governance.
TRON protocol is the blockchain entertainment content ecosystem, in which TRX, TRON’s token, is circulated. It’s native economic system enables an unprecedented one-on-one interaction between providers of digital entertainment content and ordinary users.
Therefore, content providers will no longer need to pay high channel fees to centralized platforms like Google Play and Apple’s App Store. Also, providers of content such as texts, pictures, videos, and broadcasts, will break the curse that popularity and hits cannot make profits. With the strengths of social network and value network,
TRON is committed to ecological prosperity. In relation to any community and free market economy, an incentive system that fairly and reasonably reflects the contributions made by participants is fundamental.
TRON will attempt to accurately and transparently
measure and motivate relevant participants and contributors using digital assets for the first time, thus enabling this content ecosystem with TRX.
Tron is a decentralized content protocol that aims to establish a global free content entertainment ecosystem through blockchain technology. It allows each user to freely publish, store, and own data. The content creators will be empowered through the free creation, circulation, and trading of digital assets under decentralized self-governance.
How to connect with TRON:
Website: https://tron.network/en.html
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Tronfoundation
