The View from the Office.

I met up with Ethan Chan, the founder and CEO of Allium at Two Hands in Nolita. He had the burrito; I had the Acai Bowl. We both had coffee.

Ethan founded Allium four years ago to handle the “boring” job of processing reams of crypto data and making it accessible to financial firms. 

Allium provides financial institutions and crypto customers a simple way to access blockchain data. They cover more than 100 blockchains via databases, datashares and APIs so clients, such as Visa, can display data. 

The business model is similar to Bloomberg – where I worked for three decades – in that Allium processes data so their clients don’t have to.

Ethan said it’s true many of his clients could do this work – digital asset data is public on the Blockchain after all – but it’s laborious and complex and requires continuous maintenance.  To answer even simple questions can require a data team. Allium gets around that requirement. 

Allium has raised $21.5 million, including series A from Kleiner Perkins, Amplify and Theory Ventures. Ethan said they will be looking to raise more to expand operations.

One of the things I love about Ethan’s story is that before he launched Allium he wasn’t that deep into digital assets. He was an engineer at Primer.ai working on a plethora of applications including calculating sentiment from social media.

But he wanted to run his own show and so he looked for an opportunity where he could leverage his AI skills to make a difference. Crypto fit the bill.

“You can just do things,” is a popular adage in tech these days. 

It captures both the fact that AI is creating unimagined opportunities and the reality that there is little barrier to entry for newcomers.

Ethan’s decision to start Allium shows he is one of those people.

You can connect with Ethan via LinkedIn or DM me for a warm intro.