I often talk about the world changing thanks to young people who can code. My examples include John and Patrick Collison, Stripe, who were 19 and 21 when they started their business; Andrew Kortina and Iqram Magdon-Ismail, who were in their mid-20’s when they created Venmo; Nicolay Storonsky, who was working for Lehman Brothers in 2008 and now, at 34, leads one of Europe’s unicorns Revolut; Tom Blomfield, now 33, who co-founded Monzo; Vitalik Buterin, who was 19 years old when he created the Ethererum smart contracts platform; Ollie Purdue, who dropped out of university at 21 to launch a bank; and the list goes on.
But I now have a new poster child. Literally. The 10-year-old who has a blockchain start-up.
10 years old?
Yep, 10.
In fact, she was 9 when she became CEO and Co-founder of KIDLetCoin.
The idea came to young Kaede Takenaka, a Thai schoolgirl, when she was having lunch with her mum and friends last year, and they were talking about cryptocurrencies and blockchain, and she asked if she could have her own coin.
“And I got my own coin. We created a coin on the NEM blockchain. The very next year, I taught how to do it to Master’s students,” reports e27. I guess it helped that her mum works for the NEM foundation. Anyways, the idea developed into KIDLetCoin.
According to Kaede: “KIDLetCoin was started as a way to make kids learn about cryptocurrencies by doing chores and getting coins in return. In the beginning it was designed as a system wherein parents could take coins back or not release them if the kids were not doing their chores or for being naughty. But we gave up on that idea later. In the current form, KIDLetCoin enables kids to earn KID coins for chores, or reaching new learning goals in reading/math, etc. Kids can use their KID in an online store to buy stuff.”
The startup’s ultimate goal is to create a global network of kids, who will work together on blockchain projects and educational products.
And the reason it hit my radar is because Kaede Takenaka just presented KIDLetCoin at Bangkok’s Tech Summit – I spoke there in 2016 - and she wowed the audience this year.
There you have it. Now, can anyone find a FinTech founder under the age of 9?
Chris M Skinner
Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...