Decred Investor Interviews: Ciarán O’Leary, General Partner, BlueYard Capital
Decred has started a new series profiling investors from our community. The following interview was conducted via email with Ciarán O’Leary from BlueYard Capital.
Decred (DCR): You have an interesting portfolio. What are the things you look for in making an investment?
O’Leary: There are three questions we ask: can this company or network decentralize markets, empower individuals and/or liberate data? We ask these questions because we believe that open markets based on open protocols will long-term be better for both economies and societies — and those will need strong individuals, as opposed to strong institutions. Data will need to be free, portable and user-controlled. Companies and networks that create core new open infrastructure will be able to harness incredible value while avoiding rent-seeking, so that is what we are looking for.
DCR: Tell us about some of the projects in your portfolio that most excite you.
O’Leary: We are obviously excited about Decred, because we think it has the DNA (governance, open participation, built-in perpetual development funding) to become one of the core chains for the world. Other notable investments are Protocol Labs (IPFS), Filecoin, ZeppelinOS, oscoin, OpenBazaar and Centrifuge. We are mainly focused on what we call “core protocols and building blocks,” with the occasional shot at the application layer.
DCR: How does your firm different from other crypto-focused investment firms?
O’Leary: We are a thesis-driven and long-term venture capital fund: we are not focused on short-term speculative gains but are willing to hold tokens over many years and to work with the teams over that horizon. We are not opportunistic but take views on the emerging web 3 stack and where we should play.
DCR: How did you find out about Decred, and what hooked you about the project?
O’Leary: Originally, we were re-visiting Bitcoin and a basket of other currencies to see if it made sense for us to build up a storage of wealth positions. We wanted to take a 10-year view and asked “who has the best DNA” / set-up to succeed long-term? But we continuously stumbled over the poor governance, the fact that there are de-facto gatekeepers, poor project management and development funding, etc. — so we went looking for something newer, a challenger. And that was Decred. We think that their best-in-class governance paired with perpetual funding and their open and collaborative environment with users and developers is the DNA that could achieve a breakthrough in blockchain development. We also liked the meaningful traction in terms of volumes, active miners, stakers — and the vibrant, engaged and growing high-quality developer community. More on our investment thesis here.
DCR: Decred is getting ready to launch Politeia, its proposal system. What features would you like to see developed?
O’Leary: Really anything that leads to these two things happening: i) more mainstream adoption through great UI /UX for the store of value/transaction of value use case and ii) anything that creates a powerful environment and ecosystem for developers to create an application layer around Decred.
DCR: What does the investment horizon look like for Decred and other cryptocurrencies with strong fundamentals?
O’Leary: We are prepared to hold DCR at least 5–10 years; longer if we could!
DCR: Your recent conference in Reykjavik was a fantastic gathering of stakeholders with a firm eye on the future. What was the inspiration to host the session and what should folks expect from future conferences?
Twice a year we do “BlueYard Conversations” that bring together the leading minds around the world on a topic that matters to all of us and could have far-reaching implications for markets and societies. “Decentralized & Encrypted,” “Humans & Algorithms” & “A Quantum Leap” are the kind of topics we have covered. Our first one was Decentralized & Encrypted early 2016: Juan Benet was presenting a little-known new protocol called IPFS, Zooko was pitching Z-Cash and the DAO team was cheered before their launch — little did we know…
What can people expect? A meeting of the minds and open conversations on the big topics. BlueYard Conversations are not your typical VC event.
Decred (DCR) is an autonomous digital currency with built-in governance. If you know a Decred investor who would like to be profiled, drop us a line.
