As the Pillar Platform grows its ecosystem of products, services and breakthrough technical integrations, we want to celebrate and showcase the minds behind the code.
Earlier this year we partnered with leading cryptocurrency exchange ShapeShift. A part of our highly anticipated Offers Engine launch, it was one of our most exciting integrations, helping to power our in-app exchange feature.
Learn how to make the most of the Engine and open up the world of cryptocurrency in just a few convenient steps.
We met up with Chase Thompson, ShapeShift’s Director of Business Development, to catch up on crypto and bank on the future of blockchain.
Who is ShapeShift?
It would be hard to find someone in the crypto-sphere who hasn’t come across this platform. ShapeShift is a leading blockchain company and online marketplace which gives you the power to seamlessly and securely swap dozens of coins and tokens.
ShapeShift started out as one of the first decentralised projects which let people easily swap their cryptocurrencies “cross-chain”, such as BTC to LTC, while always in full control of their private keys.
At the time of its launch, this was still a pretty novel approach, as a large majority of people were trusting their coins to centralised services. As we’ve seen time and time again with the likes of Mt Gox — and all the way through to exchange hacks and exit scams up to just one week ago — this always puts your funds at risk.
The ShapeShift philosophy is, “Not your keys, Not your crypto.”
Where does Pillar come in?
Chase says the ShapeShift team loves partnering with teams like Pillar because we make the most of their developed technology. While you can always use their desktop platform, the real magic comes alive when the ShapeShift API is plugged into other platforms and wallets, such as Pillar’s. That’s because we provide user-centric interfaces and experiences, making it not only easy, but also enjoyable to play with crypto.
There’s also a lot less room for error if you’re using Shapeshift through Pillar Wallet, because you don’t have to copy and paste addresses or keys. In fact, you can swap until your thumbs hurt, without ever having to leave the safety of your wallet.
Chase says these kinds of partnerships and collaborations are really what drives the industry forward. In fact, partner integrations are critical to ShapeShift’s core business, providing lots of transaction volume and spreading the value of crypto further.
The ShapeShift team also recently launched their new platform, kickstarting a whole new variety of partnerships. These will enable a range of value-added services that are still difficult for people to navigate today, whether that’s predictions markets, lending, borrowing, or similar DeFi tools. These new types of integrations — just like our own partnership at Pillar — will invite everyone to interact with crypto.
Making your tech 99%-proof
Chase believes that the industry still has huge usability challenges today and they want to help solve that problem. Building for people who aren’t strictly developers or tech-savvy is something the industry continues to tackle. If we want to bring more people into the crypto ecosystem, says Chase, we still need to make it much easier to use.
There’s many different ways this is being addressed, especially through collaborative efforts. A number of different protocols and interoperability projects are being driven forward by developers and teams throughout the industry worldwide.
Beyond that? Scalability continues to be a concern across the entire ecosystem. While there’s no timeframe for when this will be “solved”, we’re already starting to see some real progress in making these crypto projects and blockchains more scalable.
Until we reach those heights, we’ll just keep on BUIDLing…