Launchpool Labs Founder Spotlight
Interview with NOWwhere Co-Founder & CEO, Drew Lightfoot
Welcome to the Founder Spotlight series, where we interview Founders from the projects we incubate at Launchpool Labs. What to expect: fun stories, founder journey, the team, vision, mission, goals, and what’s in the works. None of the information shared is financial advice, and should not be treated as such.
NOWwhere is an intelligent NFT marketplace utilizing a “Netflix-style” recommendation engine that indexes, scores, and ranks assets, connecting collectors with creators and vice versa. It’s the first incubee in Launchpool Labs’ inaugural incubator class of five startups to go live and take part in the 3-month program — and we announced them just yesterday (Monday 16th, August 2021). Currently, NOWwhere is raising pre-seed ($100k), available exclusively to investors part of the Launchpool Labs Bronze Club.
Enjoy this interview with NOWwhere Co-Founder & CEO, Drew Lightfoot.
Roxana: Hi, Drew. We are very excited to have you and your team at NOWwhere be our first incubator star. Please tell us a little about yourself, how you met Matt, your cofounder, and how NOWwhere came to be.
Drew: Roxana, nice to be here indeed. Thank you. Excited to jump in. Have been making art my entire life — starting as a stop-motion animator as a teen, working around the world on TV shows, video games and feature films, then moved into film-making as a Director. Have been working with teams of incredible Artists around the globe my entire life.
I met Matt through our partners Paul + Jeff — they were working together on a blockchain digital identity project and I loved how they worked together. Matt is the crypto / strategy brain. I became fascinated with Blockchain and how it could disrupt so very many industries but specifically rewrite the game for Artists.
Roxana: What makes you really proud about your team? Can you share some funny habits / stories / hobbies that your team members have?
Drew: NOWwhere took shape in a snowy cabin in the woods — where we brainstormed, bonded and banded together, not your typical silicon Valley garage story. We complement each other nicely, only overlapping in a few areas. Each brings a unique background to the table and we challenge each other in the best possible ways. We’ve been fiercely dedicated to building this rocketship.
Roxana: Name 3 things you absolutely love about your industry, and 3 things you absolutely dislike (I assume this is what made you launch NOWwhere).
Drew: I love the limitless imagination of Art, the opportunities blockchain has opened up for Artists and the possibilities for disrupting the existing art economy. I dislike the current mess of digital art, the difficulty in finding and further purchasing art that has any relevance. NOWwhere is a response to the current ecosystem — NOW, where to find anything good or relevant?
Roxana: What has been done so far? I know it’s early on to mention partnerships, so please focus on the product journey so far. Lessons learned, exciting things that happened, which are worth mentioning.
Drew: We’re designing the journey for the Artist and Collector, making an engaging platform for them to connect, converse and transact. We’ll connect Artists with their fans and enable direct feedback and mutual reward. Ultimately it’s a data-play — rewarding fans for their data whilst emboldening artists with it. We’ve started training the recommendation algorithm and the progress is powerful. We will launch out of the gate with a ‘storefront’ type approach for the Artists and in the near future, merge into the intelligent marketplace and intelligent wallet. We’re really excited about the metaverse and are designing a compelling way for artists to create their own bespoke gallery to curate and manage their own following.
Roxana: What NFT-protocols are you most excited about, and why?
Drew: We’re really excited to be building on FLOW and our partnership for storing resource files on Arweave. FLOW was designed for mass adoption and specifically for NFTs, offering a great way to interact with NFT MetaData, allowing us to create a better user experience for both Artists and fans/collectors.
Roxana: Where do you need most help from our Launchpool & Labs community? Don’t be shy about sharing.
Drew: We need to build the community, we’ve been so focused on what we’re building, hunkered in the shadows. Launchpool Labs is an exciting opportunity to draw back the curtain and shed some light on the Frankenstein creations we’ve been designing. Further, we’ll welcome feedback during the process, ultimately making NOWwhere an exciting place to continually explore.
Roxana: Are you planning to launch any limited-edition NFT collectibles prior to going live with your marketplace? If yes, tell us more about it, and how the community can get involved.
Drew: Funny you should mention that, we’re planning to launch an limited-edition NFT collection as a means of testing the platform and rewarding our initial participants. We’ll open it to our community to provide feedback within a private-beta style launch with discounts of limited edition NFTs.
Roxana: Let’s talk about funding. What happens once the pre-seed and seed raises are complete? What is next in the books for NOWwhere: private raise, pre-IDO etc? Walk us through how the funds will be used, and how the company was funded prior to joining Launchpool Labs.
Drew: We’ve been bootstrapped to date and self-funded. After our Seed raise we will be looking to endeavor a further private round through Launchpool to give the entire community a chance to take part. Funds will be used for development, human capital, and most importantly marketing to showcase some of the amazing Artists and innovations we have in store.
Roxana: What made you want to work with us? We believe that startups choose their incubation partners just as much as incubators choose their cohort stars.
Drew: We admire the ethos and professionalism of Launchpool Labs. The size of the community is a great indicator of success and the achievements to date speak volumes. But (drum roll) most of all, the team — it’s inspiring how active you are in the space and community.
Roxana: Where from here? Tell us a bit about your future product roadmap, highlights, if there is anything available at this point.
Drew: For MVP, we’re launching the storefront for Artists to start showcasing and selling their work. This will migrate towards an intelligent wallet and marketplace that produces data to feed back to the Studio. We have great advisors to connect us to top talent through NOWstudios.
We’ll be consulting Artists on market trends and working towards their goals whether they be; to increase following, interaction or plainly earn more money from their work. We have some great partnerships lined up to take this one step further and boldly go into the Metaverse.
Further, we’re designing some exciting features that will open up opportunities for the community within NOWwhere to become more involved in the business of Art. Ultimately, we’re looking to become the tokenized recommendation engine for all NFT marketplaces. We will leave it at that. We can’t wait to share.
Roxana: Where can we find you, on the web? Please also share any bragging rights.
Drew: All socials at https://linktr.ee/nowwhere
Roxana: Thank you for your time, Drew, looking forward to working with you and the Launchpool Labs community, for the next 3 months.
Drew: My pleasure, thank you. The feeling is mutual. Let’s GO!
About NOWwhere
NOWwhere is an intelligent NFT marketplace utilizing a “Netflix-style” recommendation engine that indexes, scores, and ranks assets, connecting collectors with creators and vice versa. It’s the first incubee in Launchpool Labs’ inaugural incubator class of five startups to go live and take part in the 3-month program.
About Launchpool Labs
#beyourownVC with Launchpool Labs! Join the Launchpool Labs Investor Club, and get access to off-the-market exclusive allocations in the projects we incubate every quarter. Access offers with your NFT membership card (Bronze, Silver, Gold, Diamond), stake $LPOOL, and mine an allocation. High risk — high reward.
Launchpool Labs is a chain agnostic incubator for teams, builders, universities, & developer hubs, where teams can build MVP (minimum viable product) and MVC (minimum viable community).
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