We had a pleasure interviewing Evangelos Pappas the CEO of Ocyan. He is a Tech Entrepreneur and a Technologists with long experience in advising and leading startups’ product growth. Having started his journey since his early 20’s in founding innovative startups, and having lead the digital transformation of Tier-1 corporates in industries such as Fintech, Energy, O&G, AdTech and Logistics, now he’s the CEO at Ocyan disrupting the cloud enterprise industry. 

Ocyan was founded with the belief that a future where innovations are based on decentralized networks is more interesting, robust, secure and fair than one where they are not. Today, Ocyan is actively developing Blockchain and Cloud Innovation to make this possible, with the ultimate goal of enabling any kind of business to trade first over a decentralized network.

Can you tell us what inspired you to pursue this career path? What do you want others to take from your story?

I grew up in a family that I was surrounded by engineers and people with a math background. So I really never had a choice but to like the whole essence of problem-solving. I guess this is what magnetized me to get into programming the soonest, as I saw it as a gateway to develop cool applications, and solve problems that a 14yo teenager wanted to solve. This gave me enough knowledge to start my career in software engineering quite early, on my 17s, and start realizing the way the different business actually work under the hood. 

Having acquired my bachelor’s degree in computer science, on my 21, I continued by having my first startup in Greece, a project that was acting as a Twilio-like platform for SME businesses. But all good things have to end, and after a very successful year, the Greek economy crashed, resulting in a halt-stop for my early journey as a young entrepreneur.

So my next step for my story is bringing us to London, where I was a tech leader and advisor to different startups that were offering enterprise software solutions to large corporates and also worked in different large organizations myself too.

This is where I realized the power of Blockchain and how it is the next generation of the API economy for cross-organization integrations. And as a solution to this enterprise blockchain market growth, I bootstrapped Ocyan, my new startup, that brings the so-needed scalability that’s required for enterprise blockchain applications. 

Could you tell us about any of the interesting projects that you are working on currently?

Currently, I am full time working with my team for better growth for Ocyan. We believe for the enterprise blockchain market, the required catalyst that is needed is pragmatic, practical, and scalable platforms that can interoperate with the legacy and cloud infrastructure. Thus we are deploying Ocyan as a “Cloud OS” within the premises of our customers to have a scalable and managed solution for their blockchain integrations and applications. 

Is there a particular person who you would like to credit with helping you get to where you are? Can you share an anecdote about that?

I have been lucky enough to have met many respectable mentors that he helped me with my growth so far. But each member in my current team, I can honestly say, I am so surprised how fortunate I have been with all of them. So big kudos to my Ocyan team :) 

What are the 5 things that you think are most fascinating about Blockchain and crypto? Why?

Blockchain is the evolution of the web. As today we will never input our financial details to a web form that doesn’t have this green light on the top left corner of our browser, in the next 3-5 years, people will stop using forms and paper to input any of their personal information. So Blockchain will act as the “SSL layer” of our information, and any transaction that require this information and won’t be using Blockchain, it would surely look fraudulent. 

What are the things that concern you about Blockchain and crypto? Why?

 2019 had been the Valley of death for the growth and realization for Blockchain and crypto endeavors. The sooner we get out of this, and we understand better the practical solutions of this technology, the sooner we’ll enjoy a world that is fairer to our digital-self. 

 How have you used your success to bring positive change to the world? Can you share a story?

I am a strong believer in the “helping out economy”. This means that I am trying in my every day to help as many people and startups as I practically am able to. I have released that through this behavior, it creates a butterfly effect for my network and to do this too. As a result, I am supporting a movement of an economy whose currency is a practical exchange of help :)

What you would advise someone who aspires to emulate your career?

Learn from your mistakes, and prepare to do a lot of them

What is the one “Life Lesson Quote” that you stand by? Can you tell us how that had relevance to your own life?

 Evolve and explore fast and never-ending. 

Who would be one person in the world that you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why?

Richard Feynman, but not lunch or breakfast, but rather a hangout in a pub. 

Where can our readers find you on social media?

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/evalon
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/Hevalon