Bitcoin Forum

A good friend and I have been hashing out a plan for a while. We are both very experienced Silicon Valley engineers, and would like to provide an alternative to the ASIC mining companies that are currently monopolizing the industry. As most of you know, Bitmain and Canaan are nearly the entire industry. (Together they make up nearly 90%) Both of these companies are Chinese, and neither one of them is completely trustworthy. Bitmain in particular is considered to be evil.

With GDDR6 RAM finally becoming available in short order, there is going to be a mad scramble to upgrade mining equipment. Bitmain is now selling its old stock of ASIC miners that are obsolete in order to prepare for this new generation, and the rest of us can only react. As long as the Chinese have a monopoly on mining, there is going to continue to be a bias in how this industry develops. We would like to break that monopoly.

I know many feel that mining is going to be discontinued shortly in favor of PoS chains, but most from the developed world don't understand how mining is actually used in Asia. In countries such as China, India, and even here in Thailand where we currently are, there are restrictions on sending currency out of the country. A workaround to this, and the reason mining has become so concentrated in China, is that mining can be used to bypass currency controls. Chinese can buy equipment in Yuan, they can pay for power in Yuan, and then generate cryptocurrency that can be deposited overseas for USD. With foreign currency overseas, they can make investments that the Bank of China would not ordinarily allow. Mining isn't going anywhere as long there is such a strong use case for it.

In order to keep this post short I will stop here and just say that we have a team of silicon valley natives who have been designing chips for 20+ years. Some past projects include things like lead designer of the Sparcstation. This is a real project with actual people who know what they are doing.

I would like to know if anyone would like to offer feedback on this industry, specifically the following:

   1. Given that we are planning to do this as an ICO, who would you approach first for seed funding? We probably only need about $100k to start. After that there are dozens of syndicate investors who would probably jump in at later stages. Only the first one is really hard. (Contact me privately if you want to discuss specifics.)

   2.What are the pain points of this project? I can speak for the advantages, but I am hoping to hear some of the disadvantages that I would need to overcome in any presentation. What would a potential investor, either syndicate or smaller investor during an ICO, look at critically?

   3.Strong community support will be essential for this project. As time is of the essence, what is the fastest way to build a sizeable community behind the concept?

Any thoughts are appreciated. This is an open discussion. We are going to proceed with the idea anyway, but thoughtful, constructive criticism is always helpful.

More technical explanations and less "who should we ask for money" seem to go along way around here.  The history of asic development is fraught with scams and vaporware, presale's, ico's etc etc are all great ways to sound like another scam.

Hi Witrebel,

Thank you for your comment. I understand the previous history with scams and vaporware. The only real way to overcome this is on the strength of the team members involved. One reason many people have been burned is because, generally, the people getting involved in crypto tend to be younger and don't have a track record of doing significant commercial projects, or they outsource the development to a team that is not dedicated to the cause. That won't be the case here.

One of the reason I asked about money is exactly because of this problem.  Yes, people have been burned with presales, and this will make everyone suspicious. In this case, I am simply trying to find the best way through this minefield.  How do you fund raise for seed money when it is so easy to simply say "scam" and walk away?

I think the technical issues can be discussed at length if anyone is really serious.  Too much to write up in a post, but I'd be happy to have a conference call.

I wouldn't even consider an ICO or relying on outside investor funding if all you need is $100k to start. You should be able to get that easily through a small business loan. Many startups, not even crypto related, fail because they are primarily relying on and burning through investor funding, refuse to invest in themselves, and on top of that, have absolutely nothing generating real income to even pay the bills. If serious, what you and your team should do is invest in yourselves, build a working prototype, and go from there. Investors are more willing to invest in something when you can show them you are invested in it yourself. Most want to see that you have already done all the initial leg work and that all you really need is funding to scale.

I think you will have a difficult time getting investors if you are positioning yourself in Asia while claiming to be "fighting against" the Asian ASIC monopoly.

Hi mgoz,

Thank you for your comment. Unfortunately we are in Thailand and there are no such things as small business loans here. As much as I would like to fund this out of my own pocket, we really do need a small amount of seed funding to get moving. It is of course true that everyone wants to see something. Getting the first bit is always the hardest, because by definition there is very little to show.

Which is also why seed funding always carries the biggest rewards. In this case, we need seed funding to begin. Later, we will need additional funding to scale.

First of all, you should make a one pager which explains your idea and possibly an explainer video. You could easily setup a kickstarter or indiegogo, with a tech invention you would be able to hit your 100k seed pretty quickly. Reach out to a few tech sites with your idea, do some interviews, and then boom, you have your funding.

As mentioned in above comments, leave out the ICO for now, it has bad reputation