Web3 Leader Spotlight: Fernando Martinelli
This week, we had the opportunity to chat with Fernando Martinelli, Co-founder & CEO at Balancer, a leading DeFi protocol that provides access to secure infrastructure for liquidity applications.
With over $995 million in total liquidity, Fernando has established Balancer as the pinnacle of technical excellence, innovation & thoughtful architecture in the DeFi space. Beloved by builders, Balancer allows developers to build a vast array of liquidity pools and strategies to solve pressing problems.
What attracted you to Web3 and how did you become involved in the space?
As a Bitcoin fan I was convinced about the power of smart contracts when Ethereum launched. The first obvious use case was stable coins to me, which led me to get involved with the MakerDAO project in 2015. I then met Nikolai Mushegian who became a co-founder of Balancer protocol in 2019.
As a co-founder of Balancer Labs, what would you say have been your biggest learnings from building one of Web3's leading AMM & Liquidity Providers?
It takes time to build great things. Not taking shortcuts is essential when you are building a protocol that, if successful, is expected to handle millions if not billions of dollars. Investing in security and taking all the time needed to review/audit code is key. Always doing the right thing and being transparent pays off in the long run.
How do you see Balancer evolving over time in the DeFi ecosystem?
Balancer evolved from being a simple AMM with multiple-token pools (Balancer v1) to a very powerful platform for other teams to build their own AMMs on top. Two good examples of projects that have been building on Balancer for years and are now recognized by many for their innovations are Gyroscope Finance (who just launched their one-of-a-kind stablecoin GYD) and Cron Finance (who launched the first successful implementation of TWAMMs onchain).
Balancer v3, which was just announced last week, innovates by making Balancer yield bearing native, so that pools are 100% boosted with all their assets earning yield on other protocols like Aave yet with low cost swaps. The focus on Balancer as a platform for other teams to build on top is going to be doubled down on with vast DevX improvements across the board compared to v2.
What advice do you have for new builders entering the DeFi space?
- People are everything: make sure you find the right, passionate collaborators with whom you'll build. If you are a founder, make sure all your team has skin in the game, they should all feel like owners of your project (even small percentages count a lot).
- Don't underestimate simplicity and focus: make sure you are the best in one, maybe two things at most. Don't try to tackle a lot of problems and use-cases at once given most likely someone who is focusing on any single one of them will do a better job than you.
- Be patient, build diligently and don't expect short-term results. The crypto space can spoil us with fast adoption and crazy numbers but there are many cases of protocols that have focused on being the next shiny thing with tokenomics that are not sustainable. Most of them crash at some point hurting not only the team but also the space in general. Again, great things take time to build, if you trust in your vision stick to it and don't let yourself down!
