Event Recap: Messari Mainnet 2022 Crypto Conference

Subdued Atmosphere

• Since the start of the Crypto Winter, conferences have become much humbler in vibe, exhibition presentation, marketing swags, and the lavishness of many after parties.
• More “picks and shovels” startups on display and less application based projects like NFTs.

Focus on Building

• “Put our heads down to build and come out stronger” has been the narrative in almost every conversation, which is a refreshing change from the dominant FOMO mode of operation and mindset pre-Crypto Winter.
• Chatter shifted away from over-optimistic valuations to focusing on GTM strategies such as community building and product testing.

Prominent Speakers

• Multiple officials were incorporated as speakers into this year’s conference, including representatives from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Department of Justice. Their presence reflects a growing shift in the crypto space towards regulators working with companies.
• Other speakers included Web3 influencers like Mo Shaikh from Aptos, CZ from Binance, and Anatoly Yakovenko from Solana.

AV Portfolio & Investor Events

• EthSign x Alumni Ventures: EthSign is a Sequoia-backed, AV-invested Web3 portfolio company¹ that utilized our New York office for a speaking session and networking event after Mainnet. It attracted over 600 registrations, 300 approved registrations, and about 150 attendees.
• Helium House New York: Sponsored by the rapidly-expanding Helium protocol, this event brought attendees together under one roof to celebrate the growth of The People’s Network. Helium released the news of a 5G partnership with T-Mobile during the event. Sophia reconnected with CEO Amir Haleem and COO Frank Mong.
• Investor Meet and Greet: AV’s Fall Blockchain Fund team hosted a small meet and greet event to network with investors in the fund.

Networking

• VC Meetup: The Blockchain team had meetings with investors at Hivemind, Woodstock, Sapphire Venture, Sequoia SChindia (Singapore, China, India), former Kraken Venture, Apifiy, Galaxy Digital, Republic, Goldman, Google, Lightbank, Hash3, GSR Ventures, Tribe Capital, and Alpha Square.
• Self-Organized Events such as Women in Web3 breakfast with professionals from Softbank, OKCoin Listing, 10T, and Advanced Blockchain, as well as a networking breakfast with Cypher Capital, NewTribe Capital, and Fundamental Labs were organized.
• Coinbase x Avalanche x Aegis Dinner: Private dinners such as the one organized by Coinbase x Avalanche x Aegis were extended to the team.

Teamwork

It was a joint effort to divide and conquer. There were a plethora of events that were spread out in different locations and happened at similar times. Ray, Jack, and Sophia divided themselves among numerous events.

NOTE: Blockchain Fund 2 was managed by AV with investment team led by Ray Wu. Blockchain Fund 3 was managed by AV with investment team led by Edward Tsai. Going forward, odd number funds will be managed by Edward Tsai, even by Ray Wu. When Fund Families have more that two investment teams, each team can work collaboratively with each other, but each is responsible for investing its own assets. Blockchain Fund 1 was managed by Green Nonce, which was subsequently spun out such that it and its principals are no longer affiliated with Alumni Ventures.

¹For illustration purposes only. These investments are not intended to suggest any level of investment returns; not necessarily indicative of investments invested by any one fund or investor. Many returns in investments result in the loss of capital invested. These investments are not available to future fund investors except potentially in certain follow-on investment options.