This is a summary of the podcast with Adebayo Alonge & Daniel Park
As part of the April Month’s theme of Becoming an Entrepreneur, Daniel Park interviews Adebayo Alonge on his podcast show on the topic of Becoming an Entrepreneur.
Together they explore how to take the first step from idea to market, whether to focus on cheaper or better or newer products, how to fundraise from VC and the impact of giving on the entrepreneur’s journey.
At the end of this episode, you will learn how to become an entrepreneur including key concepts such as taking your ideas to market and fundraising as you become an entrepreneur.
This episode is available wherever you listen to podcasts.
Daniel Park is a Sales Development Representative at Hireflow.ai and Rocket, a next-gen recruiting startup in San Francisco. He is a recent graduate of Claremont McKenna College (Class of 2020), where he studied Science Management and played for the men’s varsity tennis team.
Adebayo Alonge is a 2x founder and Host of the Adebayo Alonge Podcast Show.
Introductions
Adebayo Alonge met Daniel Park through a student led project for RxAll at Claremont Mckenna College.
Daniel and other students at his undergraduate course of Social Entrepreneurship were driven to the mission of RxScanner and how it will impact many people’s lives. For up to half a year working on the RxScanner project, they spoke to stakeholders and partners and that experience helped him to take up his next position at sales & partnerships at his current job in Silicon Valley.
Questions & Answers
Daniel Park: Many people have great ideas. The first steps is hardest. What is your process for starting a new project?
Adebayo Alonge: Always started with asking myself what is pain point in my personal life right now ?
With RxAll if we could test medicines I would not have ended up with a bad medicine.
With second startup, not being able to pay with my phone in North America and the complexity of international payments.
Then I determine the market size. That there are other people who want this problem solved. Market size should be in hundreds of billions of US dollars.
I assess what others are not doing well in the space and how I can do it better.
I then validate through market surveys to generate a waitlist.
Daniel Park: Products can be better than others , or cheaper or new for target audience. Is one better than others? What factors should we consider when developing one’s own product?
Adebayo Alonge: Differentiated products give you a unique niche in market but people are hesitant to take up. In markets that are proven, take up is less difficult but difficult to stand out in the market. One is not better than other. Very unique products are more profitable however they are difficult to market or fundraise for. On other hand, me-too products even if differentiated have lower margins but easier to go to market. The most important thing is to ensure you understand the different approaches to scale marketing for each type.
Daniel Park: How has each business i.e. RxAll & StorsApp Pay benefited the other & or played together?
Adebayo Alonge: RxAll is the birthing process of my entrepreneurship and has taught me my entrepreneurship skillset. StorsApp Pay team has benefited from this experience. However RxAll has now expanded payment options to enable us collect payments more easily from customers globally.
Daniel Park: What are a few keys to a successful pitch to VCs?
Adebayo Alonge: The most important piece is how you appear to investors. Focus on being confident, assertive with a clear understanding of your industry. Not just having technical depth.
Daniel Park: Persistence is the key and pitch multiple times to be successful
Adebayo Alonge: Indeed. Pitch sevrally in order to improve your pitch
Daniel Park: How has giving played a part in your journey as an entrepreneur?
Adebayo Alonge: Giving back is super important. And you can give back in different ways such as speaking on podcasts, anchoring entrepreneurship school projects, writing technical papers for magazines etc., this puts your name out there and produces opportunities you may not even have expected.
Daniel Park: In Crypto Payments space, you had said that Bitcoin would be worth $101,200 by 2025? How did you come on this specific number?
Adebayo Alonge: I first learned why Bitcoin is a currency because people believe it represents a store of value i.e. the value of our time. This helped me decide that money is not just fiat but what people believe has store of value for their time. As I researched as per the Bitcoin protocol I found that that it resembled Gold in its scarcity. I arrived at the specific value by assuming that the value of Bitcoin will get to $2 trillion dollars by 2025 and since there will be only 21 million bitcoins, each coin should get to $101K by 2025 provided no widespread government bans (unlikely given institutional investments in the asset class) and if the bitcoin foundation does not issue more coins than planned.
Daniel Park: I hope you are right. I cannot wait to call you when it hits that price.
Adebayo Alonge: Indeed. There are 2 caveats. That the foundation does not issue more bitcoins. And secondly no massive widespread government bans. These scenarios are unlikely given the institutional investments in the bitcoin asset class.
Daniel Park: We have so far explored – How to become an entrepreneur – covering topics such as taking first steps, what type of products to develop- should they be better or cheaper or newer. We talked about VC fundraising & giving. Now I want to point towards RxAll. How has the pandemic affected the business?
Adebayo Alonge: What would have taken people 5 years to come around has happened in 1 year. The pandemic has been good for RxAll. We have grown in very high percentages Month on Month.
Daniel Park: Next 3 years, how do you expect RxAll’s business to transform?
Adebayo Alonge: I expect RxAll to expand into new markets and application areas.
Daniel Park: Every time we reconnect you always have something new in the works at RxAll
Adebayo Alonge: This is the benefit of coming from an R&D background. We came from a lab so the science team is always looking at new applications. The DNA of RxAll is research.
Daniel Park: It is always a pleasure to connect and see the advancements at your business and how you are doing. Thank you for having me on the show
Adebayo Alonge: Thank you Daniel. Take care. Bye.
Adebayo Alonge 