We’ve come a long way in crypto and blockchain. What started as a solution for the peer-to-peer payment system has evolved into disruptive technology and surprised many. The core idea of cryptocurrencies is to provide financial freedom to everyone. In this space, there are no differences and anyone who can click the right buttons on the internet will be able to transact value and carry out various functions.
Blockchain space resembles a clan culture in which there is a great collaboration among the people. On the contrary, a vast number of thought leaders and influencers in this industry are men. This resulted in a great gender imbalance. To be more precise, there are only 12.28% of women in the Bitcoin community. Despite the smaller number, there are a ton of women who have contributed to the development of the industry. Unfortunately, they are lesser-spoken of and not appreciated. This is a short attempt by us to shed light and pay respect to the wonderful women who made an impact on the crypto.
Cracking the Code with Kathleen Breitman
Kathleen Breitman is the co-founder and CEO of the Tezos blockchain. She started in the blockchain as a Senior Strategy Associate at R3, a consortium that explores the use of blockchain for banks around the world. But, her real crypto endeavours began when she gave up her day job to join the forces with her husband to launch Tezos smart contracts platform. In 2014, the duo released the official whitepaper of the project with potential fixes to what Bitcoin wasn’t able to. Despite the initial setbacks, the project had one of the best ICOs in the crypto sphere and raised a $232 Million in 2017.
The chain was coded from scratch and is widely known for its PoS staking mechanism, self-governance and on-chain governance. With Kathleen’s leadership, Tezos is doing impressively well and is standing among the top 10 most valuable cryptocurrencies at the time of writing.
A safe haven for the little bitcoin — Alena Vranova
Cryptocurrencies have always faced an issue of hacks and thefts. Putting an end to all that, Satoshi Labs launched the first hardware wallet for safe storage of cryptocurrencies. Alena Vranova is the co-founder of Satoshi Labs and Trezor. She also served as the CEO of Trezor for 4years and took the company to new heights. Later, she joined Casa, a personal key management system for Bitcoin. Being an advent supporter of Bitcoin, she is vocal and expresses her opinions through social media. Alena also authored The Little Bitcoin Book in which she outlines the story of money and how bitcoin can change the world. With her enormous experience in Business and thought leadership, Alena is indeed a role model for many in the crypto world.
Lightning Fast Transactions — Elizabeth Stark
If you are reading this, you must’ve been already aware that Bitcoin is the world’s first digital currency and is meant to serve as a peer-to-peer payment system. As the currency grew in popularity, the network was clogged with a massive number of transactions and confirmation times peaked. To counter this problem, Elizabeth Stark co-founded Lightning Labs, the firm behind the Lightning Network. She along with her team delivered the second layer protocol layer for the Bitcoin Network enabling smart contracts and faster transactions. She also has the experience of teaching in Stanford and Yale on peer-to-peer payment systems and an advisor to many blockchain startups.
Boarding the Bankers On-Chain — Amber Baldet
Cryptocurrency came into existence to bypass the traditional banking systems and provide financial freedom to the people. This innovation has brought the blockchain technology into the limelight and teased its potential. Though the financial firms are hostile towards the crypto, many are testing the waters in blockchain tech to cater their customers better. Amber Baldet played a key role in bridging the blockchain tech with conventional banks. She served as the blockchain program lead in JPMorgan Chase and also led the team which built, Quorum, an open-source blockchain platform based on Ethereum built specifically for businesses. She left the bank and co-founded, Clovyr, a startup which enables enterprises of different sizes to build, deploy and manage applications on the blockchain. Amber Baldet was featured in Fortune’s 40 Under 40 and CoinDesk’s Most Influential in Blockchain.
Podcasting with Laura Shin
Sometimes finding a reliable source of news get a bit tricky in crypto. Laura Shin comes to your rescue, she has always been considered as the most trusted voices in the blockchain. She is a Forbes Senior Editor and focuses primarily on cryptocurrency and blockchain. Her podcasts Unchained and Unconfirmed are not to be missed by anyone. She hosts and discusses diverse topics alongside influencers, techies and businessmen and women in the crypto.
A self-made star — Preethi Kasireddy
Preethi taught herself how to code and made herself a Blockchain Engineer. She worked for big firms like Coinbase, Goldman Sachs and Andreessen Horowitz. She is an avid writer and shares knowledge through blog and twitter. Her writings range from blockchain, tech & coding, to travel and health. Her simple twitter bio reveals a lot about her and the feed is refreshing. She is indeed a self-made star!
Anybody can — Tiffany Hayden
In crypto, you don’t have to be an investor or crack the code to create an impact on the community. And Tiffany Hayden proves it. She is a mother, independent adviser and a fintech enthusiast. Tiffany aims to help people around by sharing knowledge about Blockchain in simple words. She has a huge fan base on Twitter and also organises workshops and meetups to fuel the adoption of this new tech.
Time to Talk
There are many such influential women in crypto who has contributed to the development of the industry. Each of them is is a role model not only for every young woman but for everybody out there to strive for and achieve new heights. Yet, there is a great gender imbalance and we don’t often see working culture, equal pay and other sensitive topics being discussed in the crypto community. This is the time to talk about this and give the credit to women where it was meant to be. We do believe that soon women will be given equal importance and crypto will be a better place.
Did we miss anyone? Comment down below who we should mention.
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