Vikram R Singh is a seasoned entrepreneur and renowned speaker known for establishing Antier, a premier full-stack blockchain consulting firm. Under his leadership, Antier has evolved into a preferred partner for enterprises across sectors such as BFSI, Healthcare, Gaming, Supply Chain and others.
In 2009, Vikram embarked on his entrepreneurial odyssey by founding his IT startup, initially comprising a select cadre of 5 professionals. Through his visionary acumen, Antier has emerged as India’s blockchain juggernaut, growing stronger with a workforce of 700+ team members.
Vikram's contributions have earned him accolades, including being recognized among the 'Most Promising Business Leaders of Asia 2023' by 'The Economic Times.' Committed to continuous learning and development, Vikram is actively involved in building the Antier School of Blocktech, a world-class blockchain academy dedicated to upskilling and reskilling professionals.
[00:00:00] Hello everybody and welcome to the Crypto Hipster podcast. This is your host, Jamil Hasan
[00:00:07] in the Crypto Hipster where I bring you founders, entrepreneurs, executives, thought leaders,
[00:00:12] artists. You name it all over the world of crypto and blockchain. And today, hey,
[00:00:18] I always have amazing guests. I have another amazing guest, 100% of the time.
[00:00:23] This man I'm really looking forward to speaking with. Here's the Chief Executive
[00:00:27] or founder of Antir Solutions. His name is Vikram Singh. Vikram, welcome to the show.
[00:00:35] Hi, thanks Jamil and it's my pleasure to be here. So have looking forward.
[00:00:42] Awesome. I'm looking forward to it too. So let's kick off things with the first question.
[00:00:46] And that is what is your background? Is it a logical background?
[00:00:50] And what road box have you had the overcome to get to where you are today?
[00:00:56] Okay, good question. So let me start by like telling a little bit about myself.
[00:01:02] So I started in 2005 it was more of a circumstantial startup.
[00:01:07] Like I had a spondylitis so I could not work any year.
[00:01:11] So I had to be kind of a start something of my own.
[00:01:16] So that's how I got into entrepreneurship and that initial few years were quite lean.
[00:01:21] I was kind of a one man army and it was in 2009 when I gathered the courage to have five people team around me and one month back up.
[00:01:32] However, that was the day by the grace of God after that there was no looking back today.
[00:01:37] We are close to 700 team member under one roof and which makes us one of the largest blockchain consulting firm.
[00:01:45] Out of India and our vision is to become the most trustworthy brand in blockchain space Web 3 space.
[00:01:53] And so bring a right to down the line or maybe raise at the valuation of a unique on you know,
[00:02:00] raise at unique evaluation and blockchain we entered into 2017 that was so we were quite early entering.
[00:02:09] And it also marked our first year of I would say like we go into our own infrastructure.
[00:02:17] And that marks a literal success story of my entrepreneurship journey as well.
[00:02:23] So I was looking out like what should be my next growth driver and crypto was making a lot of noise at the end of time.
[00:02:29] And when I did print it and I was completely sold at the sector to vision it had behind the invention of rip roast.
[00:02:38] So so we started with the building exchange platform.
[00:02:43] So thinking that when we can envision a paperless world only these kind of platform will be required.
[00:02:49] So let's build a you know, finnacle of crypto world that's what the kind of statement we gave to ourselves.
[00:02:54] And good thing happened we evolved with this space.
[00:02:59] So from exchanges to wallets to defile lending boring protocols to NFT market places to gamify solution to meta words which is our current focus as well.
[00:03:09] So that's how we you know it will be this space and if you ask us some of the customers so we work with various enterprises and startups and also help.
[00:03:20] Bigger organizations to and design their web 3 strategy one what should be their blockchain strategy what should be their web 3 strategy.
[00:03:29] And recent example is code art was where we are bringing the second round of NFT drop which went live with just today only and got a very good response so that's what we are doing.
[00:03:45] Sounds good so you talked about you're in India right.
[00:03:51] You talked about roadblocks right and you and I are similar situations I'm in the I'm in the hedge fund capital the world and Connecticut US.
[00:04:01] You're an India and things in crypto and blockchain we're not always friendly in India you know especially in the late teens right so how do you navigate that and how has it changed since then.
[00:04:17] Great question so see we always believed in the power of technology like even when we started at the end of the course of we always believe that whether the Bitcoin or par say any other cryptocurrency will be able to make it through the government regulation but one thing it will be able to achieve.
[00:04:34] It will force the government to come up with their own CBDCs and fast forward six to seven years you we have already seen those you know things happening even in India like you know comment is trying to have already like loans there CBDC or in a retail level.
[00:04:50] And so so we always believed in the technology and we always try to solve complex problems which customer brought to us through.
[00:05:02] But you know but how we can you know introduce Web 3 into those problems right so one of the latest example like if I can give you that we recently lost a lost a product which is solving India's largest problem in e-governance domain which is called question paper leak so whenever the government recruitment exams happened happens over here in the various states like so the process is like the question paper which is designed goes to.
[00:05:31] Printing press and then gets distributed to various centers so very operationally heavy process which pose a lot of challenges as well so what we need to like to be designed is solution on blockchain using geographical encryption time based encryption and it's such a robust solution that we can challenge entire hacker community to comment break it and they will not be able to do that and we did a couple of pilots for that as well.
[00:06:00] And so for we already created history we are in first time in India a question paper was designed in a trustless fashion and printed in a real time environment and that through blockchain technology so we want to establish as a defector protocol how the you know the e-commerce application will be designed in the times to come especially the governance e-commerce domain and coming back to your question like how we navigated this thing right so.
[00:06:29] So most of our work has been like for our like western countries like out of India so we are usually like a kind of extension of as a kind of like technology partner or you can say like the people who come to us like we are in we sell our products which cut down there go to market time for example exchanges for example bullets for an empty market space.
[00:06:59] So we have a lot of processes and even layer one protocols we have very deep expertise in.
[00:07:04] ZKPS well you know account abstraction and protocol development so that's the kind of like work with we are doing it so we always stayed with the technology part and try to capture the market share wherein you know the people had you know wood legal structures you know we're in the crypto friendly company so that's how we did.
[00:07:28] We did it right you did it well you have a 700 person company so I want to know you know what is answering solutions all about now which including your vision emission why we have three blockchain.
[00:07:44] This again great question so see I.
[00:07:48] Relate to blockchain with the trust you know blockchain for me is this anonymous to trust right whenever like and you would also agree with me like when we call web 1.0 where it was static information 2.0 where it was platform driven revolution and 3.0 is like a complete ownership kind of stuff so we are the ownership you know goes back to the you know the people.
[00:08:13] In the hands of the people right so if I creating something I can always create an NFT where I can always be entitled to and every sale you know whatever happens on my IP.
[00:08:25] So our vision are brand promise our vision is to become the largest you know trustworthy branding blockchain FF3 and how we want to achieve that because what we believe that leader being a leader in an industry is not a designation.
[00:08:43] So how we can achieve that what we feel like we have to create those success stories so we have got we have given ourselves 4 goals right so to create 4 success stories in the next 2 to 3 years time one in B2C one in B2B one in B2G and one in B2E.
[00:08:59] So when I say one in B2C we have got a very promising product which is in this space of digital currencies and we are trying to reduce the barrier to entry in the blockchain space and especially also going towards the DIDs as well decentralized identities which is the you know the one of the nature you know kind of roadblock overcome you know the block application to become mainstream.
[00:09:26] Number 2 we have a B2B in B2B we have a infrastructure tool which we deploy to give it to the customers which are already working with us and number 3 as I said like we have a very good product on the Washington Bay Parley can the business to go on us domain.
[00:09:49] And last but not least in the B2E business to education we because 95% of our resources learned blockchain after joining us so this we accomplished through a landed vision which we had in house which has been spin off as a separate initiative under the name and style of untaste block tech.
[00:10:10] So we are disseminating blockchain education in the nearby colleges and universities and to start with the former local region and we will go to the India level so that's how we are trying to achieve our vision and mission.
[00:10:25] Very cool and you're also looking to activate blockchain adoption in the ever changing new normal right what is your definition of the new.
[00:10:40] Okay so what I believe that you know tech technology will keep evolving all the time right so one innovation will lead to the next pro-statement and then next pro-statement when we solve it then bring the new revolution as well so I'm like it's a kind of a circle basically so when we you know you know we did you know internet right so we had static information.
[00:11:10] And then we moved to like mobile apps you know so we are in everything could be you know accessed using mobile right and we saw that then the entire revolution the evolution changed from mobile first approach right to like from web to mobile and then we saw a platform dreamer evolution so we're you know the platform became so big that they collected the personal information of the people correct.
[00:11:40] They are created into the content created there you know like the biggest hotels like you know biggest companies in the travel industry so without owning anything right so so what I'm trying to say like a people's need to have ownership they are want to have ownership within whatever they create right will go.
[00:12:10] So we have a lot of time to come up in the times to come and which can be sold only using blockchain technology so what we believe that in the times to come the databases will be replaced by blockchains.
[00:12:24] And people will be able to create content and also have a you know royalty kind of like ownership plugged into their content so that they always have a share of profit whenever it sells you know again and again so that's how my definition for the new normal and we also see like as the crypto adoption or regulation is comes into place.
[00:12:49] The parallel currencies the similises will also come into picture as well and the government so over the world will try to build the features of you know cryptos to into the like CBCs as well which I would say like they really were real evolution real revolution will be felt because when you can program a money when you can program money that is where the true potential of the pro blockchain will be realized right.
[00:13:19] And I can program okay this is the money which I am minting is meant for education purpose or is meant for maybe the African regions right so that is where the real revolution we know it start happening.
[00:13:36] You know you talked about databases and I built I built databases for 20 years before I got into Bitcoin in 2017 and then you know as I saw Bitcoin as a database.
[00:13:50] I didn't at the time see it as money I don't realize I was stepping into a generational war between the boomers and the and the Gen Z's and millennials right you build 700 person company.
[00:14:03] You know and you have a lot of young 20 year olds working for you and so you know that requires I think that requires some kind of incredible leadership in order to do it right so I want to find out how you get along how.
[00:14:20] How you are able to build organization with you know your workers as a younger generation and you know how like at different levels in your company and how you how the leadership phrase people can take from what you're doing.
[00:14:37] Great question again so I would like to mention over here that average age in our organization you know is like between 26 to 27 somewhere around for most 75% plus team members I would say I would say like even me myself is like maybe second and third I'll just person from the top so there are two people who are added to me and I'm coming to the third place.
[00:15:05] And but it's a pretty young organization which goes it's all gives us which has old pros and cons right so when so what is different like how we can manage the you know the Gen Z generation so I would say like before we claim ourself to be in the technology may to be in the you know the technical engineering we say.
[00:15:30] Before that we are into human engineering right if you don't understand what people need and how to give them the pathways to you know grow because one thing is very important to the two young generation that they want to have the their own growth in their own hand they will not leave their growth in somebody else and right so that is very important to understand that how you can align their goals with or mission goals because.
[00:16:00] Only should kind of only grow when your people's goals are one step behind your own here behind the organization's goal right that is the only way like when all of your team members can row in the one single direction your ship can run much faster right so it is very important to understand you know what behavior how you can incentivize the desire is behavior in a way which shows the growth of the organization as well as the growth with the people as well so there are four ways like.
[00:16:28] You know people I would say learn there are people who some people in direction just like you know we have kids at our home in their early age like maybe up to seven years of age they need own interaction when they grow a bit elder same way in the office space as well professional environment as well then they need guidance right how to do something you know when they when you are from colleges they need lot of people need guidance as well.
[00:16:58] So when they grow a little bit more you know older then they need what you should that they need to understand what is in it for me right that is the kind of FM channel which keeps playing in their mind right before you want them or we get something done from them and same way happen in the in our houses as well like a with our kids as well you know in the teenagers and one last thing which you know like mix people take is the.
[00:17:28] Inspiration right when they cross 18 years or 20 years of age then they they there is a like intrinsic motivation right so and inspiration is nothing but leadership right when people would like to become you know like you.
[00:17:43] And or maybe would like to copy or maybe follow you and that is where you know the true leadership comes up so and I also believe that.
[00:17:54] Which you can't fake it you know the leadership cannot be fake right so so this is a this is how we try to navigate these challenges working with the young generation giving them the road maps the pathways to grow.
[00:18:10] Aligning and how they can their their self goals can be aligned with the original goals so that's what I believe and and culture is very important because culture is the set of behavior exhibited by your senior leadership or maybe the manager you know the people who are involved in getting the things done so if you are able to control those you know.
[00:18:33] And the culture of those people within those you know many key to the position we're able to control the culture of the organization as well.
[00:18:44] I'm I agree with you i'm just think for myself as a conflict in the way that we look at blockchains right a spot of young crowd anything into mean coins right and when I look at portfolio I try to minimize unsystematic risk by.
[00:19:03] You know by having a well defined you know like structure or like things that work in utility and I'm like it's the aping versus the you know versus the conservative management right.
[00:19:17] How do you how do you navigate that and what can we learn from these because I can't I can't even the mean coins because they you know because I'm not crypto native right.
[00:19:28] So how do you how do you facilitate the crypto native people and the non crypto native people and come up with a bet with the best product and solution for your clients.
[00:19:42] Right so I would say we need to understand the behaviors you know like the people who are really interested in the mean coins or maybe I think donated right.
[00:19:54] If you look at you know the today's young generation they are so well worst with the latest what is happening in the technology space and since crypto provides you a kind of an opportunity where everything settles instantly right in there.
[00:20:14] In there and there is no barrier to entry as well right even if you can keep your identity so do no must or maybe completely private and still entering into this world and that's what you know the young generation you know likes so any technical adoption happens with the how the how people how are interest gets evolved right so we need to understand that part right because the very reason why crypto got a.
[00:20:44] So much popularity is it provided the speed the way they wanted to achieve something it provided them that's why they can't inclined towards the mean coins as well whether there is any value behind it or there is any kind of interesting use case behind it that that's not the object with the objective is how we can you know achieve our goals.
[00:21:06] So that's the so when we so we usually stay away from that part right because whatever work we do over here they are completely use case three one right when there is a right use case that's how and we bring and I always say that the biggest barrier to the end of the adoption of the blockchain or maybe we have to be able to reach the three reason one is like regulatory second is like a.
[00:21:36] The user interface how we can ensure web transition from web to control to 3.0 and which requires you know technical and design thinking approach and third is like you know the which is more like on this capability side right so so so our focus is mainly on the use case three one you know applications and but it is a very important for us to understand as like what.
[00:22:04] Incentive is what motivates those behaviors we are in we can make a you know we can help the customer for the customer.
[00:22:15] Customer recognition as well so that is also the kind of 360 degree work we do awesome so I could talk about that I'm talking about the use and one of the one of the body use cases is real world asset tokenization right.
[00:22:33] So you know what is what is that landscape look like and you know at a high level and what's the future of our WA.
[00:22:45] That's again great question so as per our study and you know findings and research we believe that you know 2024 will be the year of you know real world asset optimization plus the weaponry gaming right and
[00:23:02] there is so much value sitting in illiquid assets and if you look at India we have gift city where in you can you know get yourself registered.
[00:23:14] If you want to do anything in real world asset as a tokenization similarly we have worked with the company in UK as well which is registered with the FCA and similarly in US as well we have a customer who is working in this domain and so we have
[00:23:31] our in host platforms which are in powers you know these initiatives and this is our primary focus as well because of this is going to bring a load of liquidity into the market and we are also brainstorming and like building some products especially for this field as well.
[00:23:59] One of the things that has to happen with the real world asset tokenization is this concept that keeps coming back it's called trust right watching trust.
[00:24:09] But in 2022 2021 2022 we had some we had some things that caused lack of trust like FTX and cell see what the implosion of central of centralized exchanges.
[00:24:24] How can we restore and rebuild trust in centralized exchanges or is the future going to be all decentralized.
[00:24:34] So it's a very tricky question because two decentralized legislation is not a reality what I believe it will always be 2.5 right not exactly 3.2
[00:24:45] and so the trust can only come as when you kind of stay very transparent and your leadership is visible in the public right so that is where you know trust comes.
[00:24:57] And what I believe like you know what needs to happen whether it is a 16 year or whether it is a real world asset organization platform that you know as we are transit through the solving complex problem like making those platforms which are not available.
[00:25:14] And so those platforms which are user friendly and easy for users to adopt but at some point of time like it also need the adoption by the leaders because when a leader in the industry adopt something.
[00:25:26] The trust automatically comes down to the you know the local level people's level so it's very important that you know the industry leaders whether they are into the real estate or whether they are into like financial initiatives or financial organizations.
[00:25:43] So they need to adopt these technologies first right and there are so many organizations working with the industries to all words and like with the policy makers to make them understand the potential and I believe like a lot of.
[00:25:57] Bigger organization now have started understanding the potential of these technologies especially like you know the one of the US brand which came up with their NFTs and you know that giving a lot of value to who is customers so yeah it is the leaders it is very important to that leaders adopt these technologies so that trust can come automatically.
[00:26:26] So you're saying like CEOs like Michael Seller and Larry Fink from BlackRock and people like that every company the leaders should be a champion for blockchain.
[00:26:38] Yes yes I would say like you are to my question your question only.
[00:26:44] Okay.
[00:26:46] Got it thank you so what it's all about I want to talk about another company that is under your umbrella right it's and crypto right one of the things that that I recognize there was something called DID right what is what is the idea about.
[00:27:09] So it's a decentralized identity is basically what we are trying to you know can we and as we discuss earlier.
[00:27:16] You know the very first thing in the adoption of the blockchain application you know is the you know user on boarding and as of now if you would notice like you know we have user data are read eyes with Facebook as well it's not very very like you know sitting with a different platform Microsoft as well.
[00:27:35] And a lot of steps happen like you know with your private information right especially in the health care side as well so when you can you know have your identities on blockchain.
[00:27:46] You will have the right to you know share like who will be the respect of that information so you can always decide and a blockchain is when it is in a blockchain you can rest assured that it will never be tempered it will never be misused.
[00:28:03] So there's the kind of trust you know it lands to the data so DID is a bigger vision we are in we want to introduce user names and bind those using them with the blockchain so that you can keep your data over there and you can decide with whom to share and for how long to share.
[00:28:25] Got it okay so I'm I get when I see because when I see everybody just try just you know going for the money you know we're going for the quick block or whatever I'm like the promises of blockchain are far greater than just the absent just just to capture money right.
[00:28:43] One of the promises is supposed to be you know identity for the unidentified you know how do you help with you know creating you know identity for the unidentified especially like in India where there are a lot of people without identity or recorded identity so how can you make a difference there.
[00:29:05] So I would say that is a kind of a goal which something which commerce can do right noted the enterprise level or maybe SME level right because the one of the reason why cryptos were invented like it was very difficult for banks to you know set up a branch for in a remote area for only 20 customers 10 customers right.
[00:29:33] So financial inclusion what I'm trying to say right so that is an initiative which leads to be taken by the governments only then these kind of things will happen.
[00:29:45] And what is in the government and the others yes that's my personal opinion that the financial inclusion the identities for the unidentified can only happen when we when the policy maker you know tries these initiatives.
[00:30:01] Got it okay sounds good so I want to thank you very much you know what I want to talk about when we think about your party roadmap is you have a call to action for strategic partnerships and why they're important why do you feel strategic partnerships are important for not just you but for the industry as we move forward into this next full cycle.
[00:30:29] Yeah so I would say when you enter into strategic partnership because in our case we have multiple on voting go voting protocols we have multiple identities protocols we have multiple layer one protocols where we have partnerships so how it helps us like whenever we want what a new customers and when we understand their use is what they try to achieve.
[00:30:56] So when you have the partnership and the awareness about these your ecosystem you can give them the best advice that this is you know which platform is right fit for that particular use case so this is where you know it becomes very important to have that kind of awareness and also the partnership within the ecosystem because there are a lot of business activities happens within the ecosystem as well to the deaf flow said.
[00:31:23] So I want to thank you very much for your time today I enjoyed this conversation I have one last question and it's easy it's how can people find out more information about you about answer solutions how can they become clients how can they come work for you how can they do any of that.
[00:31:50] People like you can visit our website and case solutions dot com or maybe just search me on Google Vikram R sync and you will find a lot of information and just get in touch with us we always reply within 24 hour 24 to 48 hours it is the maximum time we take but mostly we provide everything like very instant so maybe just get in touch over the LinkedIn you can find me with Ramar Singh on LinkedIn as well.
[00:32:20] Awesome thank you very much for your time today.
[00:32:23] Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you.