May 10, 2020

In this episode of the Millennials in China podcast we bring on our Asian-Canadian Millennial guest Aaron Choi. Aaron left Silicon Valley for new adventures in 2010 and moved first to Hong Kong, then Shanghai in 2012. He worked in mobile app advertising, before making a leap to the cryptocurrency space thanks to some guanxi (relationships). In 2019 his blockchain project Kava raised several million dollars in a successful Binance Launchpad campaign. Aaron shares his positive admiration for China and gives advice on the importance of relationship building in China’s business scene.

Show Notes:

• Aaron talks about his 10-year journey in Asia (Hong Kong and Shanghai), after growing up in Vancouver and then working for a few years in Silicon Valley.
• The contrast between Hong Kong and Mainland China, and how Hong Kong is like a stepping stone from the World to Asia.
• Working in mobile app advertising and how it was totally different between the West and China.
• Aaron talks about how he first learned about bitcoin and the early days when Brian Armstrong (CEO of Coinbase) used to hand out BTC for free just to educate people about bitcoin.
• How Aaron actually made the move professionally from advertising to crypto, thanks to some good contacts in China.
• What Aaron is doing now with Kava, and how his company managed a successful Launchpad campaign on Binance and raised several million dollars.
• Aaron’s thoughts on how to do business development and sales successfully in China, and how important it is to complement business relationships with personal relationships.

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