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The episode features Mahendra Kalahari, the founder and CEO of Avatar, discussing how Avatar is revolutionizing talent recruitment with blockchain and AI. He explains the unique tokenized talent model and performance-based rewards system. Mahendra also shares insights on the future of blockchain and NFTs in various industries.
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Key Topics Covered:
- Avatar's Innovative Talent Recruitment Model: Avatar is revolutionizing talent recruitment by tokenizing talent and enabling direct interactions between employers and candidates on the blockchain.
- Performance-Based Rewards: Avatar's tokenized talent model includes performance-based rewards for high-performing individuals, creating a system where talent generates returns for both the individual and their investors.
- Community Building and Engagement: Avatar is focused on building a strong community through initiatives like Zeely sprints and limited membership NFTs, with plans to give governance to the community in the future.
- Blockchain and Web3 Applications: Mahendra discusses the broader impact of blockchain and NFTs on various industries beyond recruitment, emphasizing the importance of utility and use cases in the Web3 space.
What was your favorite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let us know in the comments on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/@edgeofnft/
Episode Highlights:
- "I think I was exploring some new technology innovations around and I came across Ethereum and the smart contract programming." - Mahendra Kalahari - 00:03:23
- “The future is a data-driven economy, right? Today you don't own and control your data. We have to build something... where you own your data." - Mahendra Kalahari - 00:15:45
- "If you're doing anything in Web3 space... the whole spirit of Web3 is about putting people first." - Mahendra Kalahari - 00:25:15
For the full transcript, see further below.
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About Our Guest:
- Bio: Mahendra Kulahari is the founder and CEO of Avatar, a company that is innovating the recruitment landscape through blockchain technology and artificial intelligence. With over two decades of experience in technology, Kulahari has been instrumental in developing blockchain applications, crypto solutions, and NFTs. His journey into the blockchain space began around 2015-2016 when he first encountered Ethereum and smart contracts, leading him to explore decentralized working systems.
- Website: Avatr
- Twitter: @avatrdapp
- LinkedIn: Mahendra Kulahari
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Full Episode Transcript:
Mahendra Kulahari: Hi, this is Mahendra Kulahari of Avatr. You are tuned into the Edge of NFT, your choice for the most innovative insights into blockchain and the future of recruitment. Keep listening.
Richard Carthon: Hey, Web3 Curious listeners, stay tuned for today's episode to learn how Avatr is revolutionizing talent recruitment with blockchain and AI. and the unique ways Avatr's tokenized talent model is disrupting traditional employment systems. And then finally, how customizing notebooks at school was today's guest's first side hustle. All of this and more at the edge of Avatr. Cue the intro. Welcome to the Edge of NFT, the podcast created by Jeff Kelly, Ethan Jenney, and Josh Krieger, featuring a variety of top-notch guests and other hosts like myself, Richard Carthon. It's another production of the Edge of Company, a quickly growing media ecosystem empowering the pioneers of Web3 tech and culture, responsible for other groundbreaking endeavors like the Outer Edge Innovation Festival in LA and Riyadh. Today's sponsored episode features Mahindra Kalahari, who is the founder and CEO of Avatr, who brings over two decades of technological innovation, leading the development of blockchain applications, crypto solutions, ERC-20 tokens, NFTs, and securing significant capital from top investors. Avatr is transforming the $100 trillion employment market with its innovative patent-pending business model that uses fractionalized NFTs to tokenize talent, enabling direct interactions between employers and candidates. and creating performance-based rewards for both creators and community. Mahendra, it's great to have you on the show. Thanks, Richard. Thanks for having me.
Mahendra Kulahari: I'm very excited to be here and mix it up with you today.
Richard Carthon: Absolutely. Well, before we dive into this interview, I first want to like, learn a little bit more about you, because I'm always curious to learn and hear about backgrounds and how your journey got to the blockchain space. So when did you first hear about blockchain? And why did you move your career towards this direction?
Mahendra Kulahari: Well, it started with too many cups of coffee and late nights, just like a typical journey of a tech guy. But I guess during the COVID lockdown, there was a unique pause where we all got a moment to reflect, isn't it? That's when the discussions actually started with my founding partner. And we began fleshing out our unique and common dream, like paying it forward. Before that, let me introduce myself. I come from two decades of technology experience. I have worked on various applications on the internet from Web 1 to Web 3, and have launched a couple of SaaS-based cloud computing softwares. And I guess it was 2015 or 16 where I was first, you know, I think I was exploring some new technology innovations around and I came across Ethereum and smart contract programming. And there was an internal thought in my mind that, Mahendra, you are missing something out. You should give it a try. What is this new tech? And, you know, what is happening? Because there was a lot of hype and news around new tokens and new projects coming out. So I formed a team of my technical architects and we did a small POC of a decentralized working system. how can we program via the smart contracts on the chain and how individuals can participate in governance modeling, where everything is immutable and on the chain. So we did that POC and me and my technical architects became very confident that, yes, this is something we should aim for as the next evolution of the internet, right? And then COVID came on and me and my founding partner, we started fleshing out the details of how we can empower the individuals in the employment workspace. And why? Because my founding partner comes from three decades of experience in employment, recruitment and payroll. And we have our own in-house recruitment related software. So actually, we are disrupting ourselves from the Web 2.0 world to the Web 3.0 world. So that's how it all got started. But Richard, let's get into the details of how all this works. And there is plenty to unpack about this idea.
Richard Carthon: Absolutely. Well, thank you for diving into that. And that does bring us into Avatr. So like you said, you kind of created a technology that disrupts your own technology that you have. And it's addressing a significant gap in the recruitment space that we have right now. So walk us through that like, aha moment that made you realize that there's a lot of potential for tokenizing talent.
Mahendra Kulahari: Yeah, see, the tokenizing talent is a very technical word, right? Where tokenization is maybe new for a lot of people, but actually it is about, you know, creating an asset on the chain, which is immutable, transferable, tradable, and everyone can participate in the growth and promote the talent on the blockchain, right? So, imagine you are a chemical engineer, and you are based out of London, and you are looking for a new job, and I'm an employer who is looking for a chemical engineer. Now, if you compare this with the current solutions or products available in the web-to-space, you are actually talking to systems where the systems are designed in the favor of the middleman. So, in this scenario, when you are looking for a job, you are actually creating your data and your data is owned by old traditional systems. and then the traditional systems offer you the job matching your data, right? So you are not able to get a chance to directly talk to me as an employer. So this is the current world of the Internet. And whereas Web3, we are writing, we are flipping the script, we are redesigning the network in favor of the participants of the system instead of the system. So when you come to Avatr as a chemical engineer, you own your data. You create your digital profile, which is on the chain, totally controlled by you. And when I, as an employer, come on to Avatr, I get verified and trustworthy information directly from the chain, where I can see Richard is a chemical engineer. He has done these many jobs, and these are his skills which are verified on the chain. So it gives me a lot of trust to hire you and get the right fit candidate on the platform. So this is the base idea, which is very revolutionary. We are changing the old way of traditional systems into new systems designed for the future of the internet. So this is in a nutshell, but how it works, and then there is plenty of, like, as you said, tokenizing talent, right? Let me explain that. See, when you, as Richard, come onto Avatr, you create your profile. We are using blockchain as an infrastructure, which means everything is written on a blockchain. And on top of blockchain, we are using P2P engineering technology via smart contract to enable P2P communication between Richard and Mahindra as an employee and employer. And how that happens, you come to a system, sorry, first I come to a system, I create a job that I'm looking for a chemical engineer. and you see that job directly, you know, not advertised, but directly matching your skills and the system triggers or notifies you of that job. Now, here's the magic. This advertisement or this job ad, I'm using an old tech language, is converted into a smart job on Avatr. And what is a smart job? A smart job is a smart contract deployed on the chain. that becomes an engagement or a contract employment between you and me. That's P2P communication between employee and employer. Now that is one variable of the entire equation, Richard. And the more smart jobs you do, the more verified skills are on the chain, though your performance is created on Avatr. And we call that equation the APC, Avatr Performance Coefficient. So higher your APC, the system enables you to become Avatr. So by joining Avatr as a platform, you don't become Avatr. In order to become Avatr, you have to do some smart jobs, you have to verify your skills. So the system vet you that, yes, He is a chemical engineer. He's from London. He has done these many smart jobs. And these are the verified skills. And then the system enables you to become a doctor. And that is where the conversion of the idea happens onto the new internet.
Richard Carthon: Yeah, that's super cool. And I want to just dive into that even deeper. Because like, this is a really interesting model that you're putting that P2P, that peer to peer. And you know, how do you think this is going to redefine that interaction between employers and candidates? And, you know, what do you think are the benefits of direct engagement between the two?
Mahendra Kulahari: See, first of all, the prime challenge when we started was, you know, how to remove this middleman. So we removed this middleman by implementing P2P technology. And we have developed our own smart contract layer where you can create smart jobs, which becomes a P2P model between employee and employee. But it doesn't stay there. Post that, what we're doing, see, you imagine yourself as a chemical engineer, you do more smart jobs and your verified skills are vetted on the chain. you are creating your own performance as an Avatr. But post that, that smart job doesn't end when you are hired. It becomes your execution cycle of your performance. Let me tell you. Let's say I hired you for four weeks, right? Or let's say for three months. So the smart jobs will trigger you periodically, you and me, to, you know, where you will prove your proof of work, which means you have completed 40 hours in a week, or ATRs in a couple of weeks. And you will submit something to me as an employee, which I can only view utilizing the zero-knowledge proof identity, where only the signatory holders via their wallet can only see the information and approve the information. So that's the P2P communication between you and me. So when that happens, every week or two weeks, whatever we have decided to prove the proof of work and proof of pay as well. right, because that's very important to bring the trust to the employee part. So when those signs happen via your and my wallets, it creates a transaction on the chain, that this job was for three months, and you have been hired, your skills are verified, and based on what skills this job is running, it becomes the execution cycle of the entire smart job. So that's the beauty of smart contracts. See, we have seen static art as NFTs, we have seen static programming of those execution cycles. But what we are doing differently, we are implementing an execution-oriented smart contract program, which is not only viewable, but also you can execute it. So this is a smart job, right? Now, imagine you have done three smart jobs of maybe one year, three months, or four months. That is your digital portfolio, or call it digital profile, which is owned by you. And this is very different here, Richard, that the future is a data-driven economy, right? Today you don't own and control your data. We have to build something. There has to be new applications on the internet where you own your data. And smart jobs are that technology which enables you and me via P2P to own our data. So your performance is owned by you via these smart jobs, right? And these are executable smart jobs via smart contracts. I hope I answered your question.
Richard Carthon: You did. And I think what's unique about that is your point, right? Let's say that someone is in a sales career. All you really have to go off is someone's resume right now and say, like, hey, I was in the President's Club or I did X, Y, Z. And the only way that you potentially can validate that is through an ex-employer. There's no way to really prove through data that you did those things. And by having something like this, you now have a way to through zero knowledge proof validate that like, hey, if I'm saying I did these things, it's literally on chain, like, yep, these accomplishments actually happened and can be verified. Is that essentially what's happening?
Mahendra Kulahari: That is exactly right. It has to be immutable and verifiable at the same time. And that's what blockchain as a technology enables, which is a big, big drawback or a flaw you can call in today's applications of Web2Word. So you have put it rightly.
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Mahendra Kulahari: Now, that's exactly what I was thinking. What's beyond P2P? What's there? Because we have to think of a great network design not only giving the control of the data back to users, but we need to think about the incentivization, incentive models also in favor of the users. So imagine it's a bit like owning shares in a promising startup, but the startup is you and your career. Right. So this way, your talent just isn't just on display. It's actively generating returns for both you and your investors. And I'll tell you how. See, when you become an Avatr, the system enables you to create a thousand NFTs, which means, see, first of all, I need to protect you. So what I'm doing, I'm creating your soul bound token the moment you join the system. And let's say you have done two or three or 10 or 12 hours. Right. That can be decided when we go. So when you become an Avatr, you create a thousand fractionalized NFTs of yours. What does that represent is that you have fractionalized your talent, your work performance, right? And now you are enabling anyone across the world to buy your NFTs. Indirectly, they are promoting you as a talent. That's the indirect bit of it. But why should someone promote you? Because when they buy your NFTs and when they hold your NFTs, and your performance goes high, because that's the main equation of this entire P2P model. So when the performance goes high, your NFT holders are rewarded by the system in the form of tokens. And that is the core utility of our token, that the token is not only utilized by employers to create smart jobs as a fee, But as a fee, it comes to the system as an inflow ratio. And as a reward, it goes outflow to the NFT holders of high performing talents. So that's how the reward mechanism works. And it's like creating a space where your performance pays dividends quite literally. So, yeah.
Richard Carthon: Yeah. Yeah. So you're creating dividends also for the people who are working with you. And if you're performing at a high rate, you're again providing even further value to people that would want to work with you into the future. So it's almost like it snowballs on having more people wanting to work with you and you having a high performance and the actions that you're doing, which is, again, a very new and unique model of doing that. But another aspect of this, I think is really cool. And that Avatr is about the importance of borderless talent. Can you please explain a little bit more of how Avatrs transiting geographical boundaries and the impact that you see it having on the global market?
Mahendra Kulahari: See, the independent underpinning of our technology like blockchain smart contract programming, and we are also planning to launch not planning, we are developing it, an NFT open marketplace, because once you become Avatr, right, you are actually creating your thousand fractalized NFTs and anyone across the world can buy your talent, and they can promote you and get rewarded by holding your NFTs. So the whole idea becomes borderless in itself. And imagine you being a chemical engineer from London, and you are hired by an employer from Perth, from Australia. And I from Singapore is seeing you on the Avatr marketplace that hey, his APC is continuously going high. His stability curve is very, very stable. And 500 of Richard's NFTs are bought out and 500 are pending. So I from Singapore can buy NFTs and promote you. That's how it becomes borderless. So the talent doesn't have boundaries in the Avatr. Talent becomes borderless, which means you can do any job across the world based on the beauty of this digital world. But the beauty of the blockchain world is that you can buy and promote anyone from anywhere. So that's how the Avatr becomes borderless.
Richard Carthon: I don't like that. And it's especially in the world of web three, we live in a pretty borderless world right now, as long as we have access to the internet, but the talent pools, you're now competing with people everywhere. And one of the largest challenges of dealing with people overseas is again, verifying their work, being able to say things like, even if someone goes and puts on their resume, like, hey, I've done all of these things. Now that you're dealing over, like, if you're going international, sometimes it's even harder to verify, like, hey, is this person actually done all the all the things that they've said. So by having all these things on blockchain, again, it allows for verification, and for more trust into who you're going to be working with. But in order, in order to do that, you know, there needs to be a pretty strong community within Avatr. And so the community building aspect of this is at the heart of Avatr. So how do you plan to engage and empower your community to come and grow and to use this platform?
Mahendra Kulahari: If you're doing anything in Web3 space, Richard, any product, any NFT, any token, anything you are doing in Web3 space, the whole spirit of Web3 is about putting people first, right? And this is why before we thought about the community building and whatever the efforts we are doing, when we were envisioning the idea, we always thought about the people and how we can remove the middleman between the people. and build something on this new internet for the people, where the value is abstracted to the people rather than the system, right? And based on the same ethos of people first, I think it was December 2023, where we heavily started investing and putting our efforts for the community. And I'll share one thing with you. Recently, we have been running these weekly Zeely sprints within our community of Discord, I think for more than six months now, right? We launched our limited membership NFTs last year, which are only 10,000. And by buying those NFTs, you can participate internally in these communities and can play around with the Zeely sprints where there is always a reward going back to the community. So what I was sharing, you know, I think a few weeks back, we have rewarded one of our community members with a Tesla. Wow.
Richard Carthon: Wow. That's an awesome rule.
Mahendra Kulahari: And when we announced that, Richard, like probably November, when I went to the Melbourne conference and we announced that and we put the Tesla in the conference itself and people were seeing that. And I believe some of the conversation that people didn't trust us at all. They thought, all right, this is another hype, this is another, you know, way of, you know, politicizing the people inside the community and then just making them, you know, like doing some nonsense work, like follow this, follow that on all that stuff, right? But when we announced and we gave that reward, I literally became very emotional when that person was, you know, rewarded and he got the Tesla. You know what he said to my first email? He said, Mom, this is spam. Someone is spamming me.
Richard Carthon: Couldn't believe it's real.
Mahendra Kulahari: So we got his contact number from the conference. I think my business partner went to Melbourne and he gave a call and we tried to meet him. Finally, we met him. And when he saw the Tesla, he was flying like this high. And I was like, mate, this is fantastic. This is what we are doing. This is the product and this is the community for the people. So it gave me so much, what do you call it, a peace inside that how happy people are and how Diligently, the team is putting efforts for the community. So Richard, in short, we are doing a lot for the community. Every week or bi-weekly, we are running Zilli Sprints, where there is some fun activity or there is some tech activity, or maybe there is something to make people aware about some risks in this new world. But there are efforts. There are efforts we are doing continuously for the community.
Richard Carthon: That's an awesome story. And everyone listening to this right now who has ever participated in any community type of rewards, I'm sure Tesla hasn't necessarily been in the cards, but the fact that y'all actually did that is awesome. But someone's listening to this right now and might be hearing like, okay, cool. That sounds really interesting. I definitely am interested in doing more community things with you. Like what are some of those reward mechanisms that people can participate in to potentially win their own Tesla in the future?
Mahendra Kulahari: We will announce soon, for sure, definitely. See, the idea started around, you know, building a community where we are not only running some marketing strategies, you know, just to make sure people are participating. I think the vision and strategy for the community is very long term, like probably five years, because ultimately we want to make the entire idea purely decentralized. But in today's world where scalability is a huge problem and you can't process too many transactions, you can't go decentralized at step number one. You have to start somewhere where you can build the solution, actually. So what we did, Richard, we have a strategy in place. What we have, we are having five levels of our NFT, totally for members and community. So the first level we call, and this is based on sharks. So we have 10,000 macro sharks right now available in the market. And to the next level, which is tiger shark, you can only go to the next level if you have macro NFT in your wallet and you can sell out micro NFT to anyone. So there is a progressive curve of community building, right? And what is the end goal? See, I'll explain to you the end goal. The end goal is giving governance to our community. Yeah. Can you believe it? So there are five levels. You start with 10,000 NFTs, you go to 5,000 NFTs, then 2,500 and so on, and the last level, probably 1,000 NFTs at the last level. But the NFT holders of the last level will actually become the governance or the main holders of Avatr as a whole idea. So that's a progressive curve of our community growing from 10,000 dedicated members to very limited members who actually participate in the governance model of the entire idea. So that's our vision. That's our vision to give it back, but not like today, because it's a very complex idea. You need fast decision making to make this and that, and in the evolving space of infrastructure, I think we cannot let it out. We need to have some people in a very close boundary to execute it and make sure it is launched on time, it is used on time. So yes, we have a very strong vision and strategy for our community.
Richard Carthon: That's incredible. And I think having that long-term vision of how we get more of our community members involved and truly part of governance and helping lead where Avatr heads next is an awesome goal to it. It makes sense right now. You kind of keep it close to make sure it gets to that point so you can move fast and innovate and keep moving in that direction. But the goal is incredible. You have a lot of things to look forward to as it relates to Avatr and what's to come. So what are some of those ambitious goals that you have for Avatr over the next few years? And are there any upcoming milestones that you're particularly excited about that you can share?
Mahendra Kulahari: No, definitely. We have a very exciting roadmap ahead for the next 12 months, Richard. And via you and via your community, I would like to share. See, when you do a Web3 idea, there is twofold. One is a product and one is your economy. And you and I have seen a lot of projects. where it is hard to explain the utility. It is very hard. We are coming with a pure use case here, where we are disrupting the old way of doing recruitment and deployment. And we are totally doing it on a blockchain as infrastructure and smart contract programming as a P2P way. But the economy is also going to play a very important role. So via the product side, I'll explain to you what our next 12 months look like. So recently, we have launched our lean MVP version of our dApp to our internal marketing and internal community. They are testing it right now, they have a lot of feedback, they have a lot of changes, and they want to make it more user-friendly, very slick. So now we are getting those feedbacks from the internal testing and we have planned a beta version of our DAP by the end of this year. So that's our next milestone in the product roadmap. And mid 2025, we are focused to go live with our DAP. That's the next 12 months of the product side of it. On the token side of it, I think one and a half year back, it is truly commendable that we got investment funding from a family of friends or business partners and corporations. People came forward just on a plain idea, and they invested in us based on the face value, based on the idea value, and based on the passion to rewrite the application on new features of the internet. So we have the funds in-house. We are not going to stop there. In the coming weeks, we have planned to launch our token because, you know, in this world, capitalism and liquidity provision is very important to create a base value of your project, right? So when you have a strong product with a strong use case, I think it is advisable for every founder to launch the token, but with a great strategy in place. you have to protect your investors, your retail, and also your future curve of your token. So what we are doing, we are launching the token in a very limited capacity, which means low market cap. And after three months, we are starting a vesting strategy cycle for investors to start distributing their token. So that's going to start from September, and the token launchpads are planned for August, September. So it's a very aligned path. Then we have plans to go on a centralized exchange because now DEX, we are already seeing good, great curves and total value locked, total token value locked on the DEX, and it is performing very well. But it's a very limited crypto friendly network, right? Whereas exchanges bring the mass adoption of people where you don't have to be crypto savvy, and you get a lot of protection and risk from crypto exchanges. So we have a plan to go on a crypto exchange in December with our beta mapline. Then we have a plan to go on multiple regional and international exchanges in June, mapped with our Go Live strategy. So that's our token economic goal. And I want to share one more thing, Richard, that, you know. Of course. I think a couple of weeks back, we were discussing internally that Mahindra, we are seeing a lot of these pump and dump cases from the last two years. We have seen some devastated products going to dump, like FTX as an exchange has gone out because of, I don't know, there were a lot of stories, but what should we do? And when this question was asked to me, See, speculation is a must. First of all, let's agree with that. Without speculation, you cannot build new tech, which is so complex. We need heavy capital for the growth, for scalability, and for the future of this new technology. So speculation is a must. And see, people are too, you know, when you are in the trading world, right? you have two visions. And as a trader mindset, you have a long vision, you have a short vision. And the fundamentals of the project tells you what should be a long strategy, what should be a short strategy. And that is why liquidity is a must in the market for the short strategy, but with a low market cap. For the long vision, the fundamental values, a use case, a utility behind the project is a must for the long vision trader side. So speculation is very much for the healthy ecosystem. What we need is good, I would say, regulatory strategies to create a protective environment for these people to speculate in a very healthy environment. Because there is risk, and there was risk in the old system as well. Take an example, how we have come from a horse to Tesla. Without economical injections, you cannot traverse or navigate to new technologies. You can't take risks. You'll be just, you know, having a status quo of working in old models. So speculation is healthy the way I see it. But over time, I think fundamentals will drive the tokens, the values and the token prices, just as they have driven the prices in the older markets. I always remember the saying from the old Wall Street legion, Mr. Graham, that markets are a voting machine in the short term. and markets are a weighing machine for the long term. So the same applies to the speculative mindset. In other words, assets with actual substance will go longer. And this implication that it may be prudent not to let any short razzle-dazzle distract you just because something wins a popularity contest today doesn't mean it will age well. That's right. So what I as a founder is doing, implementing a right token vesting strategy to create that healthy, protective environment. So the early investors who have invested in a token, they will get the token distribution for next three years with a distribution cycle of three months, and it will start from September. And I can proudly say that everyone inside the team, the founders, the advisors, the tech, the marketing, everyone has willingly came forward and bound their hands for the next three years in a vesting cycle. And their distribution will come, and will start when the product goes live, which is next year. So now just imagine who is there to dump the token? No one. No one from the internal team.
Richard Carthon: And this is a big difference. It is. And I just want to spend a little bit of time here because for a long time in this space, there have been lessons through each of the cycles, right? So what you saw in the 17 to 18, which was the big ICO boom, you had all these products that got made and on speculation, there's just gigantic run up. But because of everyone being liquid, everyone dumped at the same time and drove everything down, a lot of those companies didn't survive. So you learn from those lessons. And you start, people start realizing that if blockchain as an industry isn't going anywhere, and you're seeing a long term vision, you have to play both the short term and the long term. And I think you did a really good job of explaining how you are building this for the long term, but still having the short term in mind so that others can participate and be part of this journey, because ultimately you need some of that speculation in there in order to help drive some initial adoption awareness and price action liquidity for the long term vision of what you're building towards, because ultimately any of these projects needs time in order to get where it's trying to go. I don't know what it is about the blockchain industry where people think you need to be an overnight success and be worth billions of dollars in a matter of days or months. But in the traditional markets, these things take 7, 10, 15, 20 years before you get to that big model. So why is there such an imbalance of time of success and the measurement of how long this takes, you have to have that vision there. So I think that's good. I think how you're going about it makes a ton of sense and is very healthy. And I think it's going to have a lot of long-term dividends for people who are choosing to come and be a part of Avatr.
Mahendra Kulahari: I can add one more practical reason behind this, Richard. See, the entire Web3 ethos is around ownership, isn't it? Yeah. And can you imagine how you would like to give ownership in a Web 2.0-oriented application? You can't. You can't. So what is the medium in Web 3.0 to give ownership back? Tokens. Yep. Tokens play the role of an electric outlet, where you plug anything into it, and you can run a coffee machine or whatever. So it plays the role of an electric outlet. to give ownership to you of your data, of your rewards. So you are building a network design where the incentives are in your favor, right? Now, here is the kicker. See, when you own something, you can do what you like with it. You can buy, you can sell, you can trade, you can hold, you can do whatever you want, right? You can't restrict people that, hey, you have this ABC token, but you can't do anything with it. So that doesn't happen, right? So imagine if you live in a world in which you could only rent houses and someday someone has given the ownership of houses to you, what will you do? Suddenly the speculation will go high. easy to understand. That's the role of tokens in Web3, where the ownership is given to you. And when the ownership is given to you, you can do anything with it. You can't restrict it. And that's why we need to launch the token out to give that ownership back to the people. And you can do sensible things around it. Low market cap, a very well planned and balanced and disciplined investing strategy so that people don't. So it doesn't favor the initial investors or the internal team who has more vision around it, right? So that's what you do as a founder of great ideas and build a sensible strategy around it.
Richard Carthon: Yeah. I think another good example, and I appreciate you sharing it. And I guess as a final question, I'm, I'm curious, just, you know, beyond recruitment, and what Avatr is doing, just looking more generally at all of the blockchain space, like, what do you envision blockchain NFTs applying to other industries and continue to evolve traditional like Web2 markets over into Web3?
Mahendra Kulahari: See, initially, it was all about tokens, because when I was studying, you know, like, when we did this POC, back in 2016, with our technical architects, right, what I understood is, you know, tokens, you can encapsulate and build ownership inside the tokens and give ownership back to the user. But from then until now, we have seen great cycles, ups and downs. We have seen a cycle of great decentralized finance applications, where there are so many great projects. I would say Uniswap and there are many others where DeFi has been really playing a great role to give the freedom of their monetary holding back to the users. That is one of the great use cases. I have seen a lot of development and improvement in the infrastructure. We have a lot of L1s, we have L2s to bring scalability, and we have a lot of intermediary applications like wallets, payment gateways, OTZs, which enables people to use this new technology and products efficiently. I think we have seen the NFT cycle, non-fungible tokens, where the entire vision of giving digital property rights to the users, and I must say one of the leaders in this space, Mr. Yat, CEO from Animoca Brands, I follow him very greatly. He has a very great vision and a very great articulated story for the ownership of digital property rights in this world via NFTs. I think recently we are seeing a lot of meme coins. There are pluses and minuses of meme coins, but the way I see it, I think it brings a cultural capital for the people to, you know, come together and participate and prosper together. So that's a great use case. There are many, many ups and downs around meme coins where we have to be very sensible, believe the people behind the project who are influencing that meme coin. I think it makes a great strategy. But now, I think, Richard, we have built enough highways and roads. We need traffic now. We need users now. We need great use cases now. We need utility-oriented, which connects with a daily user and makes them usable in a very, what do you call, consumable way, rather than you are putting your efforts and You don't know what's happening around there. So I think I would like to not only appreciate the Web3 builders, but I want to encourage them to work towards this area where we can bring great utility and use cases to this new technology. I think that's what I want to see. And it can happen in any world. It can happen in healthcare. You bring digital property rights of a contract between doctor and patient. You bring what you call fashion onto it. We are seeing a lot of fashion industry coming to this, where you can give the ownership to your loyal customer so that they can always connect it with you. You can do direct marketing to them rather than, you know, mixed up in the social world of marketing where you cannot count. Imagine you have one million followers on any social platform, right? Can you talk to one million followers straightly? No, you can't. The algorithms are not designed in your favor. So we need such solutions for such a social industry as well. And this is what, you know, makes me so passionate to do Avatr that, yes, this is required now. I need to bring traffic on these highways. And these highways are not just for show off, right? We have to run on them. We have to build on them. So that's what, you know, I see beyond recruitment, beyond the limitations of this industry.
Richard Carthon: Thank you for sharing those insights. I agree. Fashion, health care, real world assets. There's so many things that blockchain is going to touch, even NFTs. And I also want to echo your sentiment around Yacht. He has such an eloquent way of explaining where things are headed and what's already here and what's to come. And I think, you know, your passion, obviously, for job recruitment and how you're bringing that to blockchain resonates through this conversation. So we want to say thank you for spending time with us and explaining everything Avatr has going on. But now we get to spend a little bit more time directly with you and learn more about you in our next segment called Edge Quick Hitters. And now for a quick word from our sponsor before we dive into the next segment. Are you ready to take your sports predictions to the next level? Look no further than MainCard.io, the fantasy management platform that's taking the blockchain world by storm. With MainCard, every card is a ticket to excitement. You can predict sport outcomes, trade cards in the marketplace, and challenge opponents in thrilling weekly duels. And don't wait, head to MainCard.io now and start earning rewards with your NFTs, because it pays to be early. And now back to today's episode. Edge quick hitters are a fun and quick way to get to know you a little better. There are 10 questions and we're looking for a short, single or few word response. But feel free to expand if you get the urge. Are you ready? I'm ready. Let's do it. What is the first thing you remember ever purchasing in your life?
Mahendra Kulahari: That's a tricky question. I think I purchased a pair of shorts or jeans when I was in school. And there's a, I don't know why I remember this, Richard, but you know what happened? I was in those blue pants and never tried on a jean short or something like that. And I think there was a sports event coming. And I asked my dad, like a kid, you know, that I want to get this one. There's a sport coming for it. And I got that. And I was so happy buying those, you know, shorts and jeans I can remember now.
Richard Carthon: So that was the first thing. That's awesome. Do you remember those things? Like you feel so much pride towards it, right? Like it's like, ah, like I bought this.
Mahendra Kulahari: Absolutely. Yeah. You know, I was sleeping in on those pants every day, I think. Yeah. That's my vaguely vague memory.
Richard Carthon: Yeah. Yeah. No, that's a great one. Um, what is the first thing you remember selling in your life?
Mahendra Kulahari: Now based on that, I was not a studious student, but I was a very disciplined student because my dad was in the army and discipline was a must at home, right? And I remember like if I was in fifth class and I was maintaining my books and my copies Like, you know, good stickers and good book covers, good copy covers. And you are, if you're drawing something and you're putting a note in the book, you are very disciplined so that you don't, you know, spoil the book or the notebooks. And I remember when I was talking to the juniors who are below my class, and when they saw my books, they said, hey, Mahendra, we want your books. We want your notebooks. So I started selling them at a very low price. But by the time I was in ninth or 10th, I raised my price. Because it was so well maintained. Everyone wants it. Hey, your books are very much, you know, like, like a fancy sticker on your book, right? Everyone wants that. So I used to buy those stuff and put my books and notebooks in a very, you know, very, very maintained way. So I remember selling my books to the genius.
Richard Carthon: That's awesome. Your first marketplace through creativity through books. That's really awesome. That's a first. That's a first on the show, which is really cool. Always like to hear first. What is the most recent thing you purchased? The most recent thing?
Mahendra Kulahari: I'm not sure. All right. Here's a book. I think I ordered this a few weeks back from Jake
Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel. A bit off about the history. I think this is what I purchased lastly. I might have purchased other things, but I remember this one.
Richard Carthon: Yeah. Awesome. Always love some knowledge. What is the most recent thing you sold?
Mahendra Kulahari: I don't remember selling anything, but I think my daughter has taken my old iPhone. So I think she didn't pay me, but someday I will charge her.
Richard Carthon: All right. What would you consider your most prized possession?
Mahendra Kulahari: Most prized possession, right? I'm not going to talk about something which is high in price, but I can share one story with Unigine. As I said, I was not a studio student, so I never got good marks. And my dad was very strict and he came from a defense background, so discipline and all that stuff was at home. So I think I was in 10th class and I didn't, I didn't, my result was not good like in all the subjects. So he was looking at my scorecard and I went. I came home and he was looking at the scorecard and he said, English, all right. Physics and science and biology and everything like that. And then math was there and he saw the numbers in math and said, wow, brilliant. So that was a compliment I always remember when I cherish something internally, because I scored 100% in math. And that's all the subjects where I was about to fail, but in math I scored well and my dad, you know, didn't care about other subjects and he saw math and he said, wonderful, that's great. So I think it's very close to my heart where I always remember when someone asked me, hey, what do you think about yours, anything which you can share as your prized memory or prized position, sir?
Richard Carthon: Yeah, that's no, that's an awesome story. And it's cool that you know, your dad was still able to acknowledge and make you feel good about doing that. So that's an awesome story. If you could buy anything in the world digital physical service experience that is currently for sale right now, and money wasn't an issue, what would it be?
Mahendra Kulahari: A ticket to Mars? to Mars. OK. Yeah. Well, why? I think I was watching this. So I was reading this book from Elon Musk and the kind of leader he is. We all believe that he's one of the misfits. Right. And what he's doing, I think that's what really excites me is that, you know, I want a ticket to Mars if I can afford that.
Richard Carthon: Absolutely. That'd be awesome. One of the first ones to go up there. If you could pass on any of your personality traits to the next generation, what would it be?
Mahendra Kulahari: I think I was, I usually talk to my kids all the time, you know, and now I have become a boring, boring father to them, right? But one thing, why I would like to give back is focus, and I'll tell you why. See, I'm from a world from the 1980s and 90s, Richard, right? And I have seen, like, remember if I have to read about a new topic, I used to go to libraries, look out for a new book, and then you have to wait if it is already issued to someone, and then you go back after seven days again to see whether the book is available there or not. So what I'm trying to say is, you know, there were a lot less capabilities during that time. And if you compare today, we have the internet in our hands. You have a lot of capabilities around it. But the pain point around this new capability or everything around you is that, you know, distraction. It is too distracting, right? You will be like, I see my kids all the time scrawling this and that. So the focus is one thing I would like to, you know, hand over to the next generation and how to become more focus oriented in too many distractions is one thing I can manage and balance myself. So, yeah.
Richard Carthon: Yeah, it's a great one. Like you said, overstimulation is absolutely apparent and being able to just lock in on something and get things done is a great characteristic to have. On the other hand, if you could eliminate one of your personality traits from the next generation, what would that be?
Mahendra Kulahari: I'm very impatient. I want things yesterday. And I'm blessed to have my family understand me, my team understand me, but I'm very impatient. I don't know why. I think I want things to be done right now. I don't know.
Richard Carthon: Yeah. No, it's a fair one. And I think it happens to all of us, right? Like, it's just sometimes you just want it now. So I can completely understand that. What did you do just before joining us on the podcast?
Mahendra Kulahari: Just before the podcast, I think I had my eighth or ninth coffee of the day.
Richard Carthon: Staying caffeinated. Love it. And what are you going to be doing after the podcast?
Mahendra Kulahari: I'm starving. I'm going to have dinner soon after this podcast and go to bed. I think today is a very long day. Yeah.
Richard Carthon: Yeah. All right. Well, appreciate your answer to all those questions. We always like to wrap up with a fun bonus question. And today's question, since we've been talking a lot about job recruiting and everything else, what is a fun job recruiting story that you personally experienced, whether it's like your first job you ever had, or maybe it was like a memorable hire that you did, but like, what's a memorable moment in the job recruitment process for you?
Mahendra Kulahari: See, I was, See, to a recruiter, if you tell them to hire 10 people, the value to hire 10 people will be a lot lesser. Because then you will hire the strongest fit also, and the least fit also, because your reputation is not out. Maybe some candidates go low, some go high. So your reputation or valuable thought process, the irrational thought process of a recruiter is very different if you're hiring 10 people for 10 jobs. Now you imagine you are hiring one person for one job. you will be a lot more detail oriented. Your reputation is on stake if that candidate is a misfit or gone bad on the job. So that's the difference I learned very early, what is the role of a recruiter? How complex their job is to impact on employee's life and employer's life, right? And I think that is what we are fixing somewhere via Avatr. We are giving or we are solving a lot of problems of a recruiter to hire the right fit, where the trust can be enabled via the systems. and they can, you know, whether it is one or 10, it will become more informed for them, more trustworthy for them. So I think that is one of the stories I learned from my leaders and my seniors, not in my career journey. I think that's what I want to share.
Richard Carthon: No, that's a really great story and very timely with the market being where it is. There's a lot of people in the space who are looking to grow and scale up their companies. And having this type of wisdom is going to be very valuable. So thank you for sharing that story. Before we wrap, we always like to finish up with a moment called shout outs. And this is kind of just a moment for you to shout out kind of the unsung heroes that you are working with. So this could be someone you either work with, family, whomever, but this is a moment for you to shout out whoever you would like.
Mahendra Kulahari: See, I think the last one and a half year was very tough for Avatr and for the entire team, including my former partner. We have been onto a roller coaster ride. Sometimes it was very hard to explain the idea to some people. And we have gone from a lot of complexity to a simplicity of explaining our idea. So I think the entire team at this stage, Richard, to be honest, who is working on Avatr, from business people, from marketing. Marketing is a great challenge, but it's also very enjoyable. The tech team who has produced this lean version of the tab, I think it's commendable in a very short span of time. And yeah, I think investors, I think I want to include them. It's really very, you know, emotional when someone trusts you and invests in you just based on your face value and a simple idea but a great passion behind it. So I think collectively the team and the investors I would like to, you know, just shout out to them.
Richard Carthon: Awesome. Well, I definitely appreciate that. And I know they all can hear your passion through it. I know I could definitely feel your passion through today's conversation. But for everyone who's listening to this and they're very fired up and they want to learn more about Avatr, what are ways that people can learn more and be able to connect to become part of the community?
Mahendra Kulahari: I think Twitter is our go-to channel where you can follow us and there are daily updates coming in. The second is Discord. I can understand it could be a new tool for some people, but in Discord we have dedicated, you know, moderators and organizers who can, you know, touch base with you directly. We got a lot of requests there which are not in our interest, so we parked them. But yes, someone will definitely get back to you if you have queries or if you want to launch. in our Discord channel. Otherwise, I'm working 24 into 7. I raise my hands up. You know my Twitter channel. Just, you know, shoot it out and I'll respond to you.
Richard Carthon: Excellent. Well, Mahendra, I really appreciate your time today. And for everyone else out there, we've reached the outer limit of the edge of NFT for today. Thank you for exploring with us. We've got space for more adventurers on the Starship. So invite your friends and recruit some cool strangers that will make this journey all so much better. How? If you're listening, go to Spotify or iTunes or Maiko right now, rate us and say something awesome. Or if you're watching this on YouTube, join over 130,000 other followers by hitting the subscribe button and passing this episode on to a friend or two. You can also catch us on myco, that's M-Y-C-O dot I-O, and you can watch and earn for your time and attention. Lastly, be sure to tune in for the next time we have another episode for amazing Web 3 content. Thanks again for sharing this time with us today.
Outro: The views and opinions expressed on Edge of NFT reflect solely those views and opinions of the show hosts and its guests. Please make sure to do your own research. Our show is not financial advice. You understand that you are using any and all information available on or through this podcast at your own risk. Whenever making financial decisions, we recommend doing your own research and talking to your accountant for financial advice. From time to time we may feature sponsored content on the show for which we receive value and we may share links for which we receive a commission if you make a purchase through one of those links. Refer to our website www.edgeofnft.com for our full disclaimer, terms and conditions, and privacy policy.
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