The Krypital Group’s CEO Maggie Wu: Project Success is Always Our Priority!
by Bibi News
In Winter 2018, the Krypital Group helped several popular projects raise $100 million and helped them become industry leaders.
Maggie Wu is a typical Capricorn with a high sense of responsibility. From Maggie’s point of view, project success is always her priority, although sometimes it is necessary to sacrifice her own interests, she will do it.
The Krypital Group, which debuted with US $60 million, has undergone a comprehensive upgrade and transformation based on its existing brands. Its business has become more diverse and more suitable for the market. The newly upgraded Krypital Group has a focus on project incubation — the incubator, and supports services such as funding, consulting, brand management, through Krypital Capital, Apollo_8 and so on. Currently, the Krypital Group is an all-ecological, super-conceptual company that provides a project incubator, marketing, and funding services! It is building an ecological blueprint for the blockchain that belongs to it.
What changes have occurred in the Krypital Group’s business after the brand upgrade? Where will the 60 million US dollars be invested in? What are Maggie Wu’s investment experience and what are some of her ideas? Maggie Wu, the co-founder and CEO of the Krypital Group, was a guest at “Bibi News” on the evening of June 4th. She answered some questions for us. The following is the transcript of their conversation.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): Before our live broadcast begins, could you greet Bibi News fans and introduce yourself?
Maggie Wu: Hi everyone! I am the Krypital Group’s CEO and co-founder, Maggie Wu. I am happy to meet all of you.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): Maggie Wu, was your entry into the blockchain industry planned or was it by coincidence? Is there a story behind it that you can share with us?
Maggie Wu: Haha, I think it was planned and it was also a coincidence. I feel that my entry into this field was “at the right place and at the right time”. I was exposed to Bitcoin very early and started studying blockchain and cryptocurrencies in 2017. I also started investing in cryptocurrency and blockchain projects from that time, and joined a group of like-minded friends with years of entrepreneurial experience. So it was something I planned and also a coincidence that I founded the company with some of my partners.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): On your WeChat profile bio, it says “Health, Wealth, and Happiness. In many cases, these three are in conflict. Can you balance them well in life and work”?
Maggie Wu: Haha, for me, work is life and life is work. It is hard to separate these two. As for those three, I am still learning how to balance them. This is why it’s on my WeChat profile bio so I can remind myself from time to time.
I think this is the craziest industry I have been a part of. I can hardly take a break. Since teams and partners are located all around the world, jet lag is a difficult problem for me to adjust to. However, your body is your foundation for doing everything so that’s why health should always come first. I try to make myself eat healthier and exercise as much as I can.
When I mentioned wealth, I was referring to spiritual abundance. I am always pushing myself to learn more and constantly improve myself. I always set some time apart to learn more. Happiness is essential. Life is too short to not have fun.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): I saw you posted something about horoscopes on your WeChat Moments. It seems like you believe in zodiac signs?. Are you a Capricorn? What are your sign’s characteristics?
Maggie Wu: You guys are so detailed! In the past I didn’t really understand zodiacs, but recently everyone said I am a typical Capricorn, so I started to get interested in them. Most people say I’m a workaholic. Hahaha ~
According to the Internet, Capricorn has a high sense of responsibility, a strong heart, and interesting ideas.It is very strategic, indifferent outside but warm inside. I feel like I’m aligned with the description of my zodiac sign online. It is the loneliest horoscope. I just want to say that that’s me…. Hahaha (I only pay attention to the good parts!)
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): The Krypital Group was founded in 2017. Who did you start the company with? Why did you start the Krypital Group? Also, what is Krypital’s position in the market and what was the concept behind starting this company?
Maggie Wu: Krypital was founded by me and a group of like-minded friends. At that time, there was a chance for me to help our good friend Dr. Lucas to do a project overseas called CyberMiles. After the project was a success, we officially decided to establish the Krypital Group.
The Krypital Group was only a blockchain incubator at the beginning. Our work included working on projects like technical consulting, brand packaging, and the establishment of global communities and partners such as docking funds, exchanges, etc. Partners like exchanges are one-stop in-depth services. In addition to providing global blockchain incubation services for three-dimensional services, currently the Krypital Group has established a number of funds covering primary projects, secondary markets and financial services, plus with comprehensive consulting, branding and management services. As a result, our ecological structure has been enhanced.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): The Krypital Group has been active for two years. Assuming a bull market, the Krypital Group has also been through a bear market. Everyone in the blockchain industry has experienced countless setbacks and ups and downs. What major adjustments have the Krypital Group made in the past two years? What growth has you gained in two years?
Maggie Wu: In the past two years, we have learned and grown a lot. We have fully realized our advantages and disadvantages. The purpose to upgrade our brand was to make up for our shortcomings. When we go through the entire bear market cycle, we can truly understand how we can better help the project grow.
The project parties we have worked with have a high degree of trust with us. It is because of this that we also have a greater sense of responsibility and hope to have stronger capabilities to help the project.
Fans: How can we help the project pass through the bear market?
Maggie Wu: That depends on what the project needs in the bear market. A bear market may not be a bad thing, it’s a good time to settle down and take care of things.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): You are currently preparing to upgrade your brand. Does this represent an adjustment to certain businesses within the Krypital Group? In terms of brand building, what plans have you made in the near future?
Maggie Wu: After the industry entered the bear market in the second half of last year, we realized the importance of investment and secondary management. In order to better serve the project’s quality more comprehensively, we have re-adjusted the structure of the group and upgraded its brand line as a whole.
For example, we have established an independent brand for the project incubation service — the “Geeklabr”. At the same time around the incubator, we set up a marketing brand — “Apollo_8”. Finally, we set up our own fund, which is Krypital Capital.
Simply put, the Krypital Group provides a project incubator, marketing, and funding services, which also includes certain investment banking FA services.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): How large is Krypital Capital? How many projects are you prepared to fund?
Maggie Wu: The current fund size is 60 million US dollars, and a total of three Funds have been set up. Our venture capital fund, Venture Fund I, is mainly for early projects in the seed round or A round. Fund II is mainly focused on the heavily undervalued projects on the exchanges. Fund III was made for helping some family foundations manage their digital assets.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): I understand that the Krypital Group’s business ecology is very abundant. Can you introduce the specific components of Krypital’s blockchain ecological network? How did you staff different departments in your business? How did you cooperate between different sectors of your business?
Maggie Wu: As you said, our business ecology is pretty abundant. We are involved in projects from the primary market to the parallel market. As an incubator, our choice of incubation and investment track is also based on the idea of creating an ecosystem, from the mining to the exchange, from the underlying public chain to decentralized applications, while maximizing resource sharing within the ecosystem.
Our management team is also in line with the characteristics of the blockchain, in other words, “decentralized” management. Our team is currently distributed around the world. I have always advocated the notion that professional matters need to be handed over to professional people. So, our team members are professionals from different fields. Most of them have either graduated from the world’s top universities or worked at top investment banks before.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): How did you find talented people?
Maggie Wu: 1. Professional HR; 2. Professional headhunting companies.; 3. Industry resource accumulation and recommendations; 4. I always pay attention to talented people, and will keep in touch with them and wait patiently for the right opportunity.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): Is it convenient for us to talk about the profitability of different business lines? Currently, which business lines have the best revenue?
Maggie Wu: As an incubator, our revenue capacity should be relatively high in the industry. The services we provide are relatively complete and have high barriers. As I said before it is a one-stop service, and we are working very hard with the project. As long as the project is successful, we can benefit from it. Now that we have our own funds, we also hope that the projects we invest in will generate the desired returns, which is also responsible for our LPs.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): During the 2018 bear market, the market was missing a lot of money. The Krypital Group has raised more than 100 million US dollars for several projects. Is this process easy? How do you win the trust from the investors?
Maggie Wu: Yes, I mentioned before that the project is something that we have confidence in. I think professionalism and responsibility are very important. When we are working on a project, the success of the project always comes first. We do whatever it takes, including sacrificing our own interests and ensuring the success of the project. As long as we are professional enough, and sincere, the project side will notice that. At the same time, time is also a key factor in building trust. There is an old saying in China “just as distance determines the stamina of a horse, so does time reveal a person’s true heart”.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): When you sacrificed your own interests, does it improve the success of the project?
Maggie Wu: Yes, as we cooperate, we do not consider our own interests. Our team works very closely with the team on the project.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): How does the Krypital Group help these projects become industry leaders? Specifically, what services will you provide to the project side?
Maggie Wu: First of all, when we choose a project, we are very cautious and will not just take any project to work on. Once you decide to cooperate on a project, you will spend a lot of time and energy to help the project from several aspects.
In addition to our own funding to participate in investing, we will also provide white paper consulting, create the business model, and provide overall positioning and brand packaging, marketing, global community establishment and management, financing assistance, exchange docking and secondary market management, etc. The company fully supports the project and the services we provide are really intricate.
Fans: You guys are so busy and so hardworking. It’s almost like you guys are doing a babysitting service.
Maggie Wu: Yes, there are so many things to take care of… I was able to raise significantly more money last year. Only our team knows the difficulties we faced to get to where we are.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): The blockchain market is still at a very early stage. The market has not yet fully established the rules. What valuation methods do you have for various projects?
Maggie Wu: Yes, the valuation of blockchain projects last year was generally high. After entering the bear market, I felt that it was a good thing, and the valuation of the project gradually fell back to be more reasonable. Usually, the valuations set by the lead investors and the valuation of the same type of project on the market will be one of our reference standards. At the same time, we will also consider the future development space and value of the project.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): In addition, when working on investment projects, the ability to see people’s capabilities is also very important. What type of blockchain entrepreneurs are likely to achieve their success in the end?
Maggie Wu: Our team has a wealth of investment experience, and we have been investing in traditional areas before entering the blockchain field. In my opinion, no matter which industry you are in, investment is about investing in the right team and the right project.
I think that good entrepreneurs need to have a lot of good qualities. Simply put, it is necessary to have all three — high IQ, high EQ and adversity quotient. To be more specific, it is necessary to have an idea and a strong executive force, one needs to be a good leader in order to grow the team together. No matter what difficulties you encounter, you can’t give up.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): In fact, many investors worry that the bull market will make the projects’s valuation too high, which inevitably increases the investment cost. Do you have such concerns? What are the differences in investment strategies that the Krypital Group implements?
Maggie Wu: During a bull market, some investment companies follow the trend blindly which results in irreparable losses. In my opinion, it doesn’t matter if it’s a bear or bull market, investors have to remain calm and have an independent judgement. They should look towards the long-term and be thoughtful as much as possible and not dwell on small losses.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): What are the blockchain tracks that Krypital Capital focuses on? What roads do you think the blockchain industry is likely to go into in the second half of this year? What is the basis of your judgement?
Maggie Wu: We have recently focused on projects related to digital financial services, such as stable currency, cross-border payments, asset management, etc., and related to transactions, such as exchanges, secondary markets, the underlying public chain and its ecology related Dapps, as well as mining related tracks.
In the second half of the year, we believe that there may be an outbreak in the digital finance field, and there may be some strong applications. It can be seen that many professional financial institutions have entered the market, and more and more mainstream companies have begun to accept digital currency. In addition, I also have expectations in terms of compliance.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): At present, some traditional financial institutions are also entering the blockchain. How will their entry affect the blockchain ecology? In addition, what is the core competitiveness of the Krypital Group compared to various investment institutions in the blockchain market?
Maggie Wu: Everyone probably heard that Sun is going to Buffett’s lunch in the past two days. There is some very interesting data to share with you, Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has a current market value of $489 billion, and today’s digital currency market CoinMarketCap is only about $253.5 billion. In comparison, we can see that the entire digital currency market is still very small today.
I am very much looking forward to the entry of more and more traditional financial institutions. Only more professional institutions and talents have a deeper understanding of this industry, which can further promote the development of the entire industry. At present, there are many excellent investment institutions in this industry, and the biggest difference between us and our core competitiveness lies in our incubating ability. In addition to bringing funds to the project, we are able to help the project grow in all aspects.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): You have been working both domestically and in North America. What differences do you think exist between the development levels of the blockchain industry in China and the United States? In addition, what are the differences in the development attitude of the two countries to the blockchain industry?
Maggie Wu: I also answered the same question when I went to New York to attend the Consensus conference panel. In my opinion, there are three main differences in the development of the blockchain industry between China and the United States: 1. Two countries that have different views towards compliance ; 2, Their own entrepreneurial projects’ focus on their industry is different; 3, There is a big difference in the behavior of currency supporters.
Fans: (The blockchain in China and the US) how do they focus on their industry in a different way?
Maggie Wu: China’s projects are more focused on digital currency, such as the development of mining machines, as well as exchanges, which have a pivotal position in the international market. While US projects focus more on the development of technology.
Fans: Where is the difference in behavior of cryptocurrency holders?
Maggie Wu: The trading volume of Chinese holders is much larger than that of US holders. I mean the general public. The vast majority of US-owned cryptocurrency holders are starting their first purchases from Coinbase, and they generally hold mainstream currencies. Chinese users are familiar with the three major exchanges and have a relatively diverse portfolio.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): The Krypital Group has a global perspective. Where will there be other great opportunities for blockchain development?
Maggie Wu: In addition to China and the United States, we focused on the European market in the second half of last year. This year we have begun to enter the markets of South America and Africa. Countries and regions around the world, whether in developed or developing countries, have different needs, which means that there are very big opportunities in those markets. In particular, blockchains are decentralized, so the development of blockchains without borders will have broader opportunities.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): Let’s gossip for a moment, do you personally trade coins? Do you predict when the next big bull market will arrive?
Maggie Wu: I usually follow the trends and occasionally trade, but our company has specialized traders and quantitative strategists. As I said before, professional things are handed over to professionals. My personal digital assets are also given to them to take care of.
At present, it seems like it is a small bull market, but for the real big bull market I don’t think it has arrived yet. On the one hand, it depends on the progress of compliance. On the other hand, it depends on whether there will be a big breakthrough in the technical level, whether there will be large-scale application landing, or the reduction of bitcoin production. These factors will have a significant impact on the market. Maybe 2020 will be a good start.
Xiao Ping Guo (The Interviewer): In the end, how long do you think the large-scale commercial landing in the blockchain industry will take? Have you ever imagined what the world of blockchain technology will be in the future?
Maggie Wu: Large-scale commercial landings depend on compliance support, technical implementation, application scenarios, and economic model design, and may take two or three years. The future of the blockchain world, I think it will be very interesting. It will be a revolution in finance and technology and a paradigm shift of the way we currently think. I am very much looking forward to it.
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