Kicking off season 4 of the IBM Blockchain Pulse podcast, Matt Hooper is welcoming on his first guest, Harold Hughes!

A lot has changed since season 3 of IBM Blockchain Pulse. We are now in a time of tremendous uncertainty, moving into a future that will look vastly different than anything we’ve previously imagined. And in the midst of so much change, hope can sometimes feel scarce — which is why Matt Hooper is thrilled to present today’s conversation with Harold Hughes, founder and CEO of Bandwagon, an analytics and identity management company that uses blockchain to help event venues and entertainers create a more personalized fan experience while eliminating ticket fraud.

Harold’s journey as a founder is awe-inspiring (and not just because it led him to the blockchain industry)! It’s inspiring because he has built a thriving business built on real customer need, iterating and evolving over the past 6 years, joining an accelerator only when he thought it could help him scale — and he’s done nearly all of this from his hometown in Greenville, South Carolina! Harold has been thoughtful with each step of his journey and it is one you won’t want to miss out on hearing all about.

With our future being shaped in part by leaders like Harold, how can one not be hopeful about the future?

Key Takeaways:

[:00] An excerpt from today’s episode.

[:27] About today’s episode with Harold Hughes.

[2:27] Matt Hooper welcomes listeners to the first episode of season 4!

[2:54] Matt welcomes Harold to the show.

[3:14] Harold shares about what his current day-in-the-life looks like as a CEO working at home during a pandemic.

[4:22] Harold shares his journey into the blockchain ecosystem and the origins of Bandwagon.

[7:31] The research Harold conducted prior to launching his business in identifying his customer and derisking the idea, the business model, and himself.

[9:15] Harold elaborates on how he began to build his team.

[10:53] How Harold and his team came together to build the product for their envisioned customer.

[12:37] As a first-time founder, where did Harold gain the confidence that he has in trusting in himself and in others that he brought aboard early on?

[17:27] What is a fan analytics company to Harold? And how did he know that he had to expand beyond a fan analytics company early on in forming his business?

[19:56] When they first started out, what data was available with regards to fan analytics and fan identities? How were they able to collect it?

[22:24] Harold about raising external capital in 2016, a few years into running his business after going fulltime.

[23:33] What was Harold’s introduction to blockchain? What swayed Harold and his team to integrate blockchain into their business model?

[26:07] Were they always trying to solve the issue of fraudulent ticket sales with Bandwagon? Or did they only become aware of it when they moved to blockchain?

[27:10] Last year, Bandwagon participated in an accelerator in NYC which brought them further into the IBM family. What was the purpose of that accelerator for a company at their stage? Would he recommend the accelerator experience to others? And how did it further cement them as a blockchain ticketing company/blockchain analytics company?

[31:11] How many people are on the Bandwagon team presently? What is it like to lead this team as the CEO and founder? How is it different from how it existed pre-COVID? And how does Harold think it may be different post-COVID?

[36:05] What is the future of the live fan experience? Harold shares his thoughts and predictions.

[38:43] Matt thanks Harold for joining the podcast!

Sources Mentioned:

Bandwagon

The Columbia | IBM Blockchain LAUNCH Accelerator

Follow-up with Our Guest:

Harold Hughes’ LinkedIn

Harold Hughes’ Twitter @OneBandwagonFan

Looking for More Episodes?

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