CryptoSlate had the opportunity to speak with Ganesh Swami, the CEO of Covalent, a venture-backed blockchain data analytics company, and 13-year-old Gajesh Naik, a crypto and Web3 developer who gained recognition after building several DeFi tools and protocols.
Gajesh is the creator of PolyGaj which currently holds $2 million in TVL. He's joining Covalent as an Alchemist Ambassador where he'll be empowering those in the Covalent ecosystem and receive mentoring in return.
In the interview, we cover:
Ganesh, what is your professional background and how did you get into crypto?
I am a physicist by training and a programmer by passion. A data enthusiast at heart, I have been fortunate to have worked in the data space across several industries ranging from pharmaceuticals to cloud computing to today's blockchain technology. My entry into the blockchain industry came through a realization that there was a glaring lack of hierarchical, unregulated, and potentially useful data across different blockchain protocols, chains, projects, and products, each producing data in various formats.
Therefore, in 2017, in an effort to bring transparency to the crypto space, my co-founder Levi and I set out to build Covalent, an enterprise-grade solution that enables us to better arm the blockchain space with actionable data through a unified API that brings data transparency and visibility to digital assets.
Levi and I have known each other for years but we came together at a blockchain hackathon in Vancouver back in 2017. This is when we germinated the idea for Covalent and the rest is history.
Gajesh, can you tell us how you got into crypto?
In September, one of my friends had organized a webinar on the Basics of Bitcoin and Blockchain. From there, I learned a few concepts like Proof of Work (PoW), Bitcoin and Ethereum. After that, I started diving into Bitcoin, Blockchain and Crypto. After earning a small amount of Bitcoin, I purchased Bitcoin worth $5.38. From there, a few months later I was learning about Altcoins like Ethereum and got to know about Solidity.
After that, I learned Solidity and Web3.js and since, I have been doing programming for 4.5 years, Solidity and Web3.js were simple for me to grasp. Then, I did freelancing for 3 months and built my two projects, StableGaj (StableGaj is a Stablecoin Swap) and PolyGaj (One-Stop DeFi & NFT Platform)
What is the mission of Covalent and what problem is it solving?
Ganesh: Blockchain technology has been a boon to the fintech space, ushering in the next wave of innovation and transfer of broad, better security and transparency to the ecosystem. But as it progressed with numerous protocols, chains, and projects, it also became a hub of complex immutable data that increased with each transaction. Covalent aims to give this random collection of valuable data a structure to better enable it to be used by various organizations, institutions, and individuals to gather useful insights. As a data-rich solution, having indexed over 10 of the most prominent blockchain networks including Ethereum, we are capable of providing complex and granular digital asset data in a way that is straightforward and effective.
How big is the Covalent team and where are they located?
Ganesh: We are a 30+ team, comprising industry veterans in database and distributed systems. Most of us are based in Vancouver, British Columbia.
What are Covalent's major milestones so far?
Ganesh: We started with Ethereum as it is the most popular blockchain at the time. Still, Covalent plans to index ALL blockchains and provide API access to all blockchain data.
Three big milestones since last summer:
What is the Covalent marketplace and what are some of the potential use cases?
Ganesh: The Covalent marketplace is a place where developers can create their own API endpoints for their projects and list them on the marketplace for others to use. These API endpoints can be for products in all major Web3 categories like DeFi, NFTs, Social Tokens, and DAOs.
What are the major challenges of building a unified API for multiple blockchains?
Ganesh: Currently, our major challenge at this point is that we are dealing with scaling. We have had 10x the number of API requests since January, and have been scrambling to keep up with demand across chains, which is why we have been heads-down building for the last few months. One of the major difficulties is explaining just what the problem is.
This is especially true for folks that aren't into crypto, but even those that are into crypto, unless they are data geeks, initially don't understand that granular and technical blockchain data is really difficult to access. We are open to areas we need to improve. Top of mind, I'd say we have challenges with scaling as we have been growing very very rapidly this summer with all the DeFi craze. Second, I think market pricing is an unsolved problem. But since we have market traction, we aim to be the first to solve these problems from first principles.
What utility does the Covalent token (CQT) provide?
Covalent Query Token — CQT is a native utility token that will be used for network governance where token holders vote on proposals to add the system parameters. It is also a staking asset. Validators will earn fees for answering queries. And the token fulfills data queries for users of the API.
What is the purpose of the Covalent Alchemist Ambassador program?
Ganesh: The Alchemist Program gives people a unique opportunity to showcase their skills in the Web3 space. We take equity stakes in the ever-growing and talented Covalent community. The Covalent Alchemist Ambassador Program is our way of making it an extension of the core team.
Covalent Alchemists act as key members in developing the Covalent ecosystem. Moreover, just as they are invested in Covalent's development, we are invested in their own growth at all levels to help them succeed.
Gajesh, why did you decide to join Covalent as an Alchemist Ambassador?
Gajesh: I see Covalent as a great project and they have been very welcoming & helpful. Covalent provides a unified API bringing visibility to billions of blockchain data points and for my project, I am using their API for taking the Sound, token balance of a wallet and more. Their API is fast compared to taking the same data from RPCs.
Why is it more likely we will live in a multi-chain world versus a few blockchains handling all use cases?
Gajesh: As more and more developers move into the space, the ability to solve difficult problems will become less complex. In the short term, Ethereum will win in the short term owing to its community and network effects but the future definitely looks multi-chain keeping in mind that the tooling around multichain and interoperability gets easier.
Why will Generation-Z be a leader in blockchain adoption?
Gajesh: Crypto is a level playing field where anyone with an internet connection can start learning and dive deep into the space. Generation-Z's are the first fully digital-native people who start interacting with the internet right from the get-go. For most Gen-Zs, failure or any challenge that we face is just another opportunity to learn.
Where can readers go to learn more about Covalent?
Ganesh: The best place to learn about what's happening in the community is to join our Discord and interact with the team and 7000+ Covalent enthusiasts. We're also very active on Twitter, Reddit, and Telegram.
