Bitcoiners - Live From Bitcoin Beach

How El Salvador's Bitcoin Ecosystem Launched a Tech Company in 28 Countries | Edgar Borja of K1 Technology

• Mike Peterson

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Why trust a custodian with your sats? Edgar Borja (@k1elsalvador) breaks down K1's self-custody Bitcoin ATM, on-chain and Lightning buying, and Bitcoin in Bolivia.

Edgar walks through K1's new update, buying Bitcoin on the Lightning Network and on-chain, what's happening with Bitcoin adoption in Bolivia, and what it's like pitching investors 5,000 times. K1's machines now support on-chain and Lightning purchases with full self-custody, cutting out Strike, Blink, and OpenNode entirely. Edgar demos a live on-chain purchase and explains why every K1 transaction is RBF disabled, so once it's broadcast, it's final.

K1 machines now run in 28 countries. That growth reflects real tech innovation in Bitcoin hardware, built for the global market from day one. The team solved for different bill sizes, currencies, and KYC rules in every country they shipped to. Edgar covers how KYC gets configured machine by machine, why K1 stays buy-only for now, and a cash-dispensing module already demoed at the Adopting Bitcoin conference.

Small business owners get a direct pitch here. Edgar walks through the three K1 tiers, Mini, Mini Plus, and Mini Global, plus pricing and why the bill acceptor is the hardest part to build. If you're exploring digital asset management or a new source of business growth, a Bitcoin ATM in a coffee shop or corner store is a low-friction way to start.

Then there's Bolivia. Edgar saw a fiat currency failing in real time, banks offering 6 Bolivianos to the dollar while the street rate hit 10. The government built its own workaround digital payments network just to keep money moving. This is what pulls people toward hard money. Watching their savings shrink every week, people in Cochabamba are turning to Bitcoin.

Edgar also shares K1's education tools: a crayon-and-paper workshop that teaches private keys, and a board game called MerkColor that teaches Merkle trees in under a minute. He talks about pitching investors an estimated 5,000 times on a Bitcoin startup accelerator and reality show, plus his advice for founders: fall in love with the problem you're solving. Hit subscribe, share this with someone who thinks Bitcoin ATMs are just coin machines, and tell us in the comments if you'd trust a machine with your private key.

—Bitcoin Beach Team


Learn more about Edgar Borja:
X: https://x.com/K1ElSalvador
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/k1elsalvador
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/k1elsalvador
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/k1elsalvador/
Web: k1.sv
Email Address: borja@k1.sv

Support and follow Bitcoin Beach:
X: https://www.twitter.com/BitcoinBeach
IG: https://www.instagram.com/bitcoinbeach_sv
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@livefrombitcoinbeach
Web: https://www.bitcoinbeach.com

STAY AT BITCOIN BEACH: https://www.stayatbitcoinbeach.com/punta-mango-villas

Browse through this quick guide to learn more about the episode:
00:00  Intro
01:40  How many countries run K1 Bitcoin ATMs now?
02:07  How does a self-custody Bitcoin ATM let you buy Bitcoin on-chain?
08:49  Can you buy Bitcoin from an ATM without KYC?
13:08  Where are Bitcoin ATMs actually installed in the real world?
16:23  Why are Bolivians turning to Bitcoin as their currency collapses?
25:18  What is it like pitching a Bitcoin company on a startup accelerator reality show?
37:42  How do you teach kids about private keys and self-custody using crayons?
47:31  Which self-custody Bitcoin ATM should you buy and how does shipping work?
57:29  Is Bitcoin still winning in El Salvador after the IMF deal? 

Live From Bitcoin Beach

Edgar Borja:

And that's how I met the investors, you know, people who are just walking around, one of them here in El Salvador, actually both of my investors, I met them here in El Salvador because of the Bitcoin ecosystem, and you know, just from from an equal to using the machine to then if they, if it sparked some interest, explaining how it, how the business model works, how our company works, and then continue to build on the relationship. So, is it super easy? And you know, nothing worth it is super easy, but if you're willing to put the legwork and to, and to really, you know, make effort. Being from El Salvador in the Bitcoin ecosystem is has been extremely beneficial for us.

Mike Peterson:

Edgar, it's been a while since we've had you on the podcast. It's great to have you back here.

Edgar Borja:

Thank you, Mike. I mean, it's, it's really a pleasure to be here, and really, really thankful for the opportunity.

Mike Peterson:

It's crazy, all this, the growth that you guys have seen since, since we last spoke to you, all the cool things that you guys have going on at K1 and I love the fact that K1 is a company that was born in El Salvador out of the Bitcoin law, being absolute here, you know, built by Salvadorans, and now you guys are exporting around the world, so I love seeing that.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, thank you. Now, K1 machines are in 28 countries around the world.

Mike Peterson:

Wow, 28 that's impressive. So, for people that aren't familiar with the product, or those who you know are only familiar with the old models, give us kind of some updates, and what is K1 like? What, what is your guys' mission as a company, and then you can talk about some of the new, like, educational things too that you guys have.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, our mission is just to make Bitcoin accessible to everyone that has, you know, that works on multiple fronts, because our machines are the easiest way to buy Bitcoin in the world, basically. You know, we've been around the world now, and it's the easiest way to buy it, and we continue to make it easier. One of the new things that we're really, really excited to launch this year, we're already testing it in a couple of places, is that the machine allows you now to buy bitcoin on the Lightning Network, but also on chain with the lowest fees, you know, possible. Can you imagine, for example, buying Bitcoin on chain using a coin, and it works. That the hardest part was getting it to work, but then you know we're also launching self-custody from the machine.

Mike Peterson:

So I'm sorry, just, just to be clear. So, are they actually buying it on chain? They're buying in Lightning.

Edgar Borja:

No, no, you can buy it on chain,

Mike Peterson:

You can buy it on chain.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, we, the machine, technically the machine has a limit of 1000 Sats. So, for example, the owner of the machine now has full custody of the Bitcoin. Before, the machine needed to be connected to a third-party custody provider, like, you know, Strike, Blink, OpenNode, different different vendors that have this feature. Now the machine itself has a wallet, so if I go into the machine's liquidity, I see that there's two QR codes. So the owner of the machine simply tops up the machine itself. The machine has its own wallet.

Mike Peterson:

Okay,

Edgar Borja:

And then you can just make it available for everyone. And now let's see, we can set it in Italian, German, Japanese, English. There we go.

Mike Peterson:

Nice.

Edgar Borja:

So now we can do a small purchase. We can do a small purchase on chain, even, which before used to be only lightning. So I'm going to drop in $1 and then just a quarter, or it could be a five, a 20, even 100 So, what I'm going to do, I'm going to prepare from my wallet. Let me see, I'm going to use my BlueWallet this time around to create an on-chain Bitcoin QR code, so okay, and Bitcoin is so cheap today, discount day,

Mike Peterson:

Discount day. Yes,

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, so that's an on-chain QR code. I don't know if you need it. Yep, you got it. So just tap on continue. Here, this machine is set up, and then it'll give me a detail saying, okay, you're buying $1.25 The machine has a fee right now, 0% because it's for a demo, but yeah, the machine owner sets the fee they. Want, and then it details the on-chain fee. Apparently, the fees are a little bit high right now, 40 cents, so some movement on the on the blockchain. But after seeing this detail, I just click on continue, and then after a few seconds I get the transaction, and I can check it from my, from my phone, should appear there within a few seconds. As we know, an on-chain transaction takes on average 10 minutes to confirm. However, something that's very important it cannot be replaced by, you know, the machine owner or anybody else saying, I'm going to spend more bitcoin to get it to go somewhere else, so it's as good as done, so it's I just bought, you know, let me see, how much did it get? Did I get in the end 80 cents by spending$1 in something, but it was on chain and fees are high,

Mike Peterson:

You can pay on chain fees. If you did it through the lightning, it'd be obviously a lot cheaper.

Edgar Borja:

it would be probably, you know, close to one or two sets, yeah, or if we did a $20 purchase, for example, or a $10 purchase, I could do it on chain for the same fee, yeah, because it won't, it won't change.

Mike Peterson:

So I'm a little embarrassed to admit this, but I'm not familiar with the creating the receive QR code. I've never done a transaction like that, is that common in all the wallets now?

Edgar Borja:

Pretty much. I mean, as long as you have.

Mike Peterson:

I guess I just use Bitcoin in a very simple way, just making purchases with it.

Edgar Borja:

No, actually, you know, for daily transactions, it's normal just to use Lightning, that's what we expect. But even in Lightning wallets like Blink, which is, you know, one of the best wallets and one of the most commonly used ones.

Mike Peterson:

Hey guys, just a reminder, the best way to really understand how Bitcoin is impacting El Salvador, and what's happening here, is to get some boots on the ground and come visit. And, of course, we're excited now to have locations both in El Zonte and Punta Mango, where we have guest homes there that you can rent, that everything can be done in Bitcoin. So, we have the Bitcoin Beach Suites in El Zonte, and we have Punta Mango Villas in Punta Mango, and you can find all that on the Stay at Bitcoin Beach website. So, make sure that you check that out, and if you're planning on coming down, make sure you're staying at a place where Bitcoin is going to be welcomed, and that you'll be surrounded by other Bitcoiners.

Edgar Borja:

You can create a Lightning QR code, which will work on the machine for you,

Mike Peterson:

To receive.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, for even lower transactions, like we could buy five cents right now on Lightning, but Blink also has the option to do on chain, or if you have even a hardware wallet or an or a cold wallet. A cold wallet can display a receive qr code, so now you can buy bitcoin directly to your cold wallet.

Mike Peterson:

I guess. I guess maybe I'm getting confused. I guess that does make sense. It is the standard way you always show a QR code, but I'm guess I'm just not used to it being like that on the,

Edgar Borja:

Not from a machine, no, because it usually it's much more complicated. Yeah, we just jumped over, you know, so many steps,

Mike Peterson:

So that just makes it.. it's just like you're doing a peer to peer transaction,

Edgar Borja:

Exactly. And yes, that's what you're doing, exactly.

Mike Peterson:

But I'm even trying.. I haven't bought from an ATM in forever, but I'm complicated. Yeah, remember it being a complicated process.

Edgar Borja:

But it doesn't need to be.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah,

Edgar Borja:

So that's that's the barrier we're breaking, you know.

Mike Peterson:

And, and no KYC?

Edgar Borja:

That can be enabled on the machine. So, depending on the regulation, as you know, we are technology manufacturers, and we sell machines to South Africa, to Bolivia, to Japan. Each country has their own regulation. KYC can be enabled on the machine after a certain margin or after a certain amount, and that can look like as simple as a type in your phone number, you get an SMS, and then you confirm your identity up to some other steps as well.

Mike Peterson:

Okay, interesting. And what do you guys have any insight into what percentage of the people are doing on chain versus lightning? I guess if they're, if they're self-custodial, you don't have that information, or maybe you do, I don't know how

Edgar Borja:

Well until right now, every machine has been lightning only. Okay, every one of our machines, because they were designed for small transactions, but now you can, you'll be able to do on chain, even for small transactions, which gives you another level of anonymity and another. Level of self custody, because you're not, I mean, you don't need channels to, you know, the network or to a node that's well connected. I mean, it's you're just broadcasting sign transactions from the machine to the going well. You know, people, the people who understand the power of, you know, a machine doing on chain and lightning in a completely self-custody way. I think it's going to be to be turning some heads.

Mike Peterson:

No, I love that. And you're saying you can update your old machines, they don't have to upgrade the hardware there.

Edgar Borja:

No, no, no. The same, like for example, we, one of the places where we're testing the new software is in Berlin, Uzo Lutana, here with the Bitcoin Center, and they recently received one of our earliest machines as a donation, you know, the people who owned it donated to the center. It's, it's one of the earliest versions of our machines. We update, upgraded it for them, and it's now working with the latest software, so now they can do on chain and lightning at the Bitcoin Center.

Mike Peterson:

I love that. I love that. So, are you seeing any new demand with this new feature, or is it so new that people don't.. you're still trying to get the word out.

Edgar Borja:

Well, we're just letting people know right now. So, now we've been.. we've been talking to. right now it's been a closed beta, so Berlin, and then one more place where we're testing it, that's close to us as well, because it's very early, but so far we have had a great feedback, and we'll be, we haven't announced it really on our social media, but we really, we're really looking forward, because it also broadens the market for K1 you know. Now, before it used to be at Lightning Machine, now it's a Bitcoin machine, you know. If you have an on-chain invoice, if you have a P2SH, you know, pay to script hash, if you have a cold wallet, if you have a Volt 12 invoice, if you have a Lightning address, you know, it works with everything now, so it really broadens our scope, and you know, being able to give back also, you know,

Mike Peterson:

And do the K1's continue to be buy-only machines.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, for now they continue to be buy-only machines. Also, at the last Adopting Bitcoin Conference, we demoed a module that was basically it's a separate module that allows you to withdraw cash from the machine that's still in development. We did some demos at the Adopting Bitcoin Conference, and so we expect that to come later this year.

Mike Peterson:

And because of the, like, the physical structure of your guys' machines, they're they're primarily in businesses where you have employees, they're a countertop machine, they're they're not something that you would just leave, you know sitting out open to the public without some type of supervision, but I'm just curious, have you seen anybody come up with any like kind of cage for it that they put it outward facing or anything like that that actually that makes it no need to have any employees?

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, actually I think that the most, what do we call a lockdown machine that I've seen was from one of our friends here in El Salvador, actually in San Juan Tepezontes. So, greetings to Harrison, if you're watching, he'd set up his machine. He has what we would call here in El Salvador Tiandita, you know, Tiandita de Pueblo, a little corner store, where he sells, you know, from sandals to milk to Bitcoin, and he just basically built a metal structure around the machine, and people com, they just help themselves with the machine, but yeah, the machine is designed mostly with the same security constraints as a cash register, so it needs to be under supervision, and that's the idea behind something like this, obviously. You're not going to have, you know, $30,000 or 100,000 in here. It's designed for small amounts, and just as an approachable way,

Mike Peterson:

Just to be clear, you'll never have dollars in there, you'll have Sats in there. So,

Edgar Borja:

I mean, when people use it to buy, you know, sometimes,

Mike Peterson:

I guess, I guess the dollars they have in, they put in, but exactly,

Edgar Borja:

Exactly, but it's not designed for large amounts. It's designed to be approachable, to be less expensive than other machines. So you can have it in a coffee shop, you can have in a little, in a little corner store, where maybe a full-size ATM would not necessarily fit or be the best option.

Mike Peterson:

So, for all you small business owners out there, if you want something that will, you know, drive Bitcoiners to your location, be a conversation piece, and also just help drive Bitcoin adoption, this machine is perfect for that.

Edgar Borja:

Absolutely, I mean, it's the easiest way to buy Bitcoin in the world.

Mike Peterson:

I love that. Have you seen any stores? I'm trying to think how that would would work. I'm wondering if you could, rather than having something that disperses Bitcoin, allow them to use this, like if people want to pay in Bitcoin, and they could just pay in, you know, if their bills 20$20 they could pay $20 worth of Bitcoin into the machine.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, absolutely.

Mike Peterson:

Have you seen that happened, or is that?

Edgar Borja:

Yes, services, or if you pay for a cup of coffee in Bitcoin, and the machine is right there, so you can just go use the machine, and then immediately get 10% discount for your purchases. So it's a way to educate the people who have never used digital payments, even, or I've never used Bitcoin at least.

Mike Peterson:

I love that. I love that. So, I know we have some, some videos and some, some pictures of the stuff that you guys have going. But tell me about your trip to Bolivia. I know you guys sold a number of machines down there, and I'm curious to hear what's.. I, this is the first time that I've seen this. Well, when we were preparing, you know, half an hour ago, I saw this photo. I was like, "What? I didn't know this was going on in Bolivia. So, tell us a little bit about your trip down there, and then what you're seeing in the Bitcoin scene in Bolivia when during your trip there.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, I mean, I had a short trip to Bolivia, but there is a very,

Mike Peterson:

They did a great job. This isn't like,

Edgar Borja:

It's a beautiful place,

Mike Peterson:

Halfway done. I mean, they went all out.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, yes, definitely. Greetings to my friends from, from Bolivia. You know, they are. it's called Kiosco Bitcoin in Bolivia, they have basically this nice boutique clothing, you know, high-end clothing shop, but also at the same time they have a coffee shop in the same space, and then they have a Bitcoin education space, and they do Bitcoin events with people from around, so they have, they are starting basically their own network of Bitcoin ATMs, and you know it was between, you know, buying one machine for that place or buying a group of K1 machines, which are, you know, lower cost of entry, and then having been them being available around the city, so I was in Cochabamba, for it was a short trip, but it was very productive, you know. We were able to collaborate with the people on the side, share some Bitcoin education, get them, you know, up and ready with the machines, but also seeing the reality of a country where the economy is going through a difficult time. Just one of the things that I learned, you know, the hard way is that if you go to the ATM to get into the regular ATM to get money out, you get the bank rate, but then if you go on the street to trade your dollars, you get a different rate. Right now, the banks will give you six Bolivianos for $1 and when I was there, the rate on the street was 10, Lubianos for $1 So,

Mike Peterson:

So anybody who's traveled to Argentina is kind of familiar with that. So, if you use like a credit card there, you get the.. do you get the bank rate?

Edgar Borja:

Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Anything you pay with your credit card gets charged directly to your account. It's the bank rate. It's the official government rate,

Mike Peterson:

So I'm assuming most everybody's doing things in cash. Then,

Edgar Borja:

If you're a tourist, yeah, you'll do, you'll want to do everything in cash. They are having also trouble, you know, with the global financial system. So, the government had to set up an internal payment network using QR codes, you know, from account to account, without going through through the banks or through the traditional channels, it's just a government sponsor, they just call it paying with QR, but it's, you know, from your Bolivianos bank account to your to somebody else's Bolivianos bank account, they basically needed to build a side channel for their infrastructure, so a lot of people are interested in Bitcoin as a way to protect their wealth long term, you know. We are, you know, we were just talking about Bitcoin volatility, and today is a, is a good day to buy Bitcoin, but imagine your currency crashing every day, you know, and every week, you know, it's going to be lower and lower and lower and lower. So people are looking for a lifeboat, and that can be Bitcoin, and these, this organization is, is doing that, you know, making it available. We're really happy to be able to partner with them to do that.

Mike Peterson:

So, while you were there, did you like see people come in that were like first timers that were like,"Hey, I'm looking for a way to guard this value of them accumulated, or what did you see any activity? I know you were there for a short amount of time, so

Edgar Borja:

It was a short time, and it was more like working directly on the machines and with the staff, but I was able, you know, to talk to the staff to hear from them what they're seeing in the people, and also to talk to them, you know, about some of the strategies that we have used in El Salvador, and also in other places, to teach people about Bitcoin, you know, from, you know, one of the tools we use is giving them, and I was able to get one in Bolivia to get a silver coin from the country, so Bolivia, just as most of Latin America used to use silver coinage, and actually I do have a little silver coin here that I always carry in my pocket, so this is one of my educational tools, so I have a little silver coin from El Salvador, and I use it to teach and to tell a story, and this is, you know, part of the what I was talking to the people in the stuff from Bolivia, I told them this coin, it's just the same size as a US dime, but it's silver, and my mom would tell me when I was little, we would take a pesettia, it's what they call them, like a little peseta, a pesetilla, and we could buy three pupusas and a cup of coffee, and we would have enough for a pastry, and nowadays, if you, you know, this is worth three three pennies, you cannot buy, I don't think even a piece of candy with your pennies, but if you look up the silver value in this, it's over $5 in silver, and if you have $5 I mean, you can absolutely get three pupusas and a cup of coffee, and even a little pastry.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah,

Edgar Borja:

But nowadays that's not the case. So that's how we teach about, you know, hard money versus, you know, color color pieces of paper, which is what we have now, and it was mostly working with the staff, you know, giving them tools, sharing experiences, and besides, you know, doing the technology work, upgrading the machines, connecting, you know, to the for the machines to be able to accept Bolivianos, which took a little bit of time, but you know, our friends were really patient and helping us get everything set up.

Mike Peterson:

So, do you have it set up now that they can take the paper currency there in Bolivia?

Edgar Borja:

In Bolivia, yes. So those right now they have eight machines, six of them will accept the, they're ready for paper currency, and the other two are only for coins. That's how they requested them.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah.

Edgar Borja:

And then you know you can put in a five Boliviano coin, or you know, 100 Boliviano notes, and people are starting to use them, and they had a few events, even last year, when they were even doing only coins, and they had a lot of activity with people curious, I mean, people, I mean, when the boat's sinking, everybody's jumping to the to the life raft, right, so lots of lots of people interested in learning about Bitcoin through one of the machines,

Mike Peterson:

And did you get any sense while you're there of what the government's attitude towards Bitcoin is in Bolivia?

Edgar Borja:

Not really. I mean, what what I learned is that right now there's not an official posture, you know, neither on favor, and at least not against, for now,

Mike Peterson:

Which sometimes is the best way to have it.

Edgar Borja:

I mean, that'll be ideal, you know, if the government let people, you know, use the money they prefer. Obviously, there's a strong incentive for the government to determine which money the people use, but at least right now there's no, there's not a lot of regulatory hurdles. I mean, it's pretty simple to start using Bitcoin.

Mike Peterson:

Awesome. Yeah. No, I'm now.. now I want to go visit that business and meet the folks behind it. Yeah, absolutely. They're great. It's amazing to see that that's happening there in Bolivia. Yes, we obviously we work with, you know, a lot of different places throughout Latin America, and I was not aware of this, so I love, I love hearing about stuff out of the blue.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, it's a strong, you know, concerted effort that they're doing, and we're really just happy that they selected K1 as their technology solution, and just continue to support them throughout the way. And there's other efforts going on in Bolivia. I was able to talk to some of the other Bitcoiners in the area, even even the guy who, from a coin collector, from whom I got my bull. Give you an silver coin, you know, for my, for my education stack. He told me, yeah, I'm a Bitcoin, or too, you know, because if you, if you understand how money works, yeah, and you see your money sinking, you know. And so we're just creating more opportunities for people to learn about it.

Mike Peterson:

So, besides traveling and selling machines all around the world, I know you become a TV star recently, Paco, maybe you can play that clip from so just to set the stage a little bit, you participated in an accelerator that was hosted here in El Salvador, I think the people hosting it were from Turkey or were from maybe all over,

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, people from all over that moment. The CEO was, you know, Salvadoran that moved to, well, a Salvadoran descendant born in Portugal. Then there were people from Eastern Europe involved. There were some people also from Korea, Salvadorans. some Americans,

Mike Peterson:

But I was talking about the ones that were actually running it, but the and then they brought together all these companies from from around the world that are not, not necessarily in the Bitcoin space, but that were in the tech space, and,

Edgar Borja:

Some of them from the Bitcoin space, and some others just from the tech space. Yes, and it was hosted here in El Salvador, it's called X founders, and I was, you know, K1 was part of the, the, that batch, you know, for that season.

Mike Peterson:

Was it 20, or how many? How many businesses did they bring in? 15?

Edgar Borja:

No, we were eight businesses.

Mike Peterson:

Okay, eight. And you guys all lived together during that time, right?

Edgar Borja:

Pretty much. Yes. For one month in the one of the hotels in downtown San Salvador, in well,

Mike Peterson:

I'm sure you had to go back and forth home and see your wife.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, yes, I had the privilege that, since it was in my home country, and just, you know, a 15 minute drive from home, I got to go home most of the night.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah,

Edgar Borja:

Sometimes, I needed to stay overnight,

Mike Peterson:

Because you guys were working all night.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, we did some, you know, what do you call it? You know, I don't know, just coding until we get it done, but it was, it was really fun. I learned a lot, and I'm happy that, you know, part of parts of the things that I learned have been even beneficial, because I've been able to reproduce that training as well. So, that's it's been really cool.

Mike Peterson:

Let's have Paco play the clip, and then I want you to kind of elaborate on what things looked like on a day to day, and, and for people that are considering that, have businesses that are considering going into something.

Edgar Borja:

Absolutely. My name is Edgar Borja. I am the CEO and founder of K1 Technology. We are building the easiest way to buy Bitcoin in the world. Edgar, the diplomatic clue.

Speaker 1:

Edgar from K1 has such vision. So, when I first met Edgar from K1 I was just mind blown from first second, right? I have a huge amount of respect for what Edgar has built, and this thing is just one piece of the puzzle,

Edgar Borja:

Where K1 Bitcoin for everyone,

Mike Peterson:

So for people that are kind of just curious as to what this is involved, because I was actually the one that called you and said, hey, I met these guys actually in Seoul at the Seoul Bitcoin Conference, and they were looking, they were talking to me about the fact they were coming to El Salvador to host this accelerator that they also film, and they premiere. I don't know if they.. I think they just show it on YouTube, but they had quite a few views. They've done this in other places, and they've helped companies get investment, and you know, make those connections, and so I, I thought of you, I was like, okay, maybe this would be a good fit for Edgar, and, and where you guys were at with your company. So, tell, tell us a little bit about that process of participating in an accelerator. What are the upsides? What are the downsides? What are the things that people should consider if they get an opportunity like this.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, absolutely. So I think, as you mentioned, you know, I found out about them from you, and then later on I got the call from their team, so it was Nelson who was on the, like, one of the first people in the, in the video and part of his staff, and they told me, you know, we are going to do a reality show, and it's going to be about companies in the Bitcoin ecosystem, and would like you to be one of them. So, at first of all, at first, you know, I was a little, you know, I wanted to find out more about them. Fortunately, this was the third season, so the first two seasons had already, the first one was had been completely published, and the second one was being released at the time, so I was able to get a sense of what the reality show was about, because I told them, you know, if it's about if they're going to be filming me under the covers of the bed and taking a shower, I'm like, no, I'm not into that. Yeah, but no, you know, it was more of, I mean, their goal in the end is for the companies who sign up to be able to, you know, score investment with real investors, so they will not show anything that makes you look, you know, silly or sometimes silly, but you know, within, within reason, within reason, so it was a very professional experience we had, we were in the, in the hotel for about a month. I was able to go back and forth, but the rest of them worked in the hotel for about a month, and then, because we're local, we also had the whole filming crew come to the K1 office, which a short clip was shown in the, in the, in the preview, and you know it's just the level of production is unlike anything I had ever seen here, because we had, I think, when they visited the K1 office, we had 15 people, you know, from the director to the drone operator, the light, the lighting people, the camera man, the sound team, you know, like we were just talking to my partners, and we said, you know, if we had paid for a team like this to come and film a day in the life of K1 it would have been, you know.

Mike Peterson:

I mean, that's impressive that they had that level of production, because we've done a lot of, you know, filming with different entities, and outside of 60 minutes, like nobody brings in a team like that. Usually, it's like two people, you got the cameraman and one other person. So, the fact that they had 15 crew members.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, I counted them, and then I bought some Choco bananas for them afterwards. Yeah, I have to share some of the Salvadoran culture.

Mike Peterson:

Yes,

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, I mean, we did takes, as I said, you know, at the hotel with even challenges. We went to the Santa Ana volcano, because to see, you know, that your determination with it also in downtown San Salvador at the National Theater, we had the final, the closing activity was a pitch day, so we used one of the side, it's called the piano room, in the, in the, in the theater. It's a beautiful room, and we had, you know, a big screen, and the cameras, and everything. It was really interesting, the connection, the connections we made during the, during the boot camp were, you know, really strong, even you know, talking to investors, talking to fellow founders, sometimes you know, just sitting across the table, if you're going to be, you know, with everybody for a month, you know, you sit across the table from them, start talking about their startup, then you tell them about your ideas, and then, okay, maybe you can do this, you can do that, and it's people who are, you know, in the household, people who are working on this every day,

Mike Peterson:

And people don't understand the, like, the pressure and the headaches and the joys and the sorrows that come with, with being a founder,

Edgar Borja:

And all of us were founders with active companies, so we were, you know, doing the TV show full time, and then we were working full time as well, so you got to see, you know, people, you know, I need, hold on, I need to go make a call because Futbol Club Barcelona wants to use our product, and it's, you know, exciting and stuff like that. So we're able to, you know, support each other, you know, sometimes help with our decisions, and then get help during our decisions. Then we had access to coaches, a lot of the coaches were, you know, really great people with great trajectories, then obviously you know it's there's always, you know, a little bit of this that I'm not fully agree with this, but most of the time, you know, it was in my mind it was a very positive experience, and I really, really liked it. It helped us understand how, in the end, it was how to pitch better.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah,

Edgar Borja:

How to pitch better. You know, what are the questions that investors are going to get? And we got destroyed by investors, but that's that's how you reveal stronger, right? So, we,

Mike Peterson:

As an entrepreneur, you don't necessarily know you're seeing things one way, and so to have somebody come in and say, no, this is the way investors are going to look at it.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, absolutely, because,

Mike Peterson:

Super helpful.

Edgar Borja:

As an entrepreneur, you might be, you know, really excited about something. Like, right now, I'm really excited about the new software update and everything, but the investor comes to say, 'Okay, how is that going to help you sell more units? How are you going to make my investment, you know, increase in value through the work that you're doing right now? And that's that's how we understand it now, something that you know, some of the pieces were absolutely there, you know, being ourselves, you know, the founders of the company, we have invested into it as well, and we want to see those returns, but it's not the same when you go asking for $2 million and that 2 million needs to turn you 20 million, yeah, so you need to show the pathway here, just so here are the seven steps that will take us from 2 million to 20 million, and then being able to articulate it using the language, and to practice, you know, pitching to, because an investor might be here one day, then the next week you get two more investors that drop by. We had a lot of help from the Starknet Foundation, which is, you know, another entity that was also part of the. Of the event, so it was, it was really, really good.

Mike Peterson:

I know when I talked to the folks kind of behind it in Seoul, they were saying that, you know, part of the reason, the big part of the reason they decided to bring it to El Salvador was because of the Bitcoin adoption here, and so for me it was so exciting to see that you have this, you know, worldwide show accelerator kind of reality TV thing wanting to be based in El Salvador, and to have that be the hub, because El Salvador was seen as one of the most exciting places where things are really happening.

Edgar Borja:

And it continues to be seen like that, you know, I, it really helped us, you know, the what would you call it? I don't know if it's the branding behind El Salvador or just the history of the transformation. When we bring one of our products, even you know, nowadays outside the TV show, in the real world, will we bring a Bitcoin product made in El Salvador? It has a weight to it, you know, because,

Mike Peterson:

People are more likely to want to hear from you, and to actually take a serious look at you, because they're excited to participate in some way with what's happening.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, absolutely. You know, people now associate El Salvador with a positive outcome with Bitcoin, which didn't happen before, and that has been very helpful for our company as well. It was during the show, and it continues to be now.

Mike Peterson:

I've heard that before from people talking about when they'd go to Bitcoin conferences, they'd say, like, when people hear from your El Salvador, it's like all of a sudden you're kind of a minor celebrity, even though nobody, you know, they don't know who you are, but they're like, oh, you're from El Salvador, and they, you know, they want to hear the story.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, it's, it's really fun, actually. You know, one of the craziest things happened at one of the Bitcoin conferences, from, you know, the Bitcoin conference, I think it was, it might have been the one in Miami, at the end of the conference, we had some T-shirts made, you know, Bitcoin in El Salvador, surfing, you know, all of little drawings and sketches around people were bidding for our T-shirts because they wanted to take home as a souvenir the Bitcoin El Salvador T-shirt. I just got another shirt in exchange for mine, and I keep it, you know, as a souvenir from my friend Sean from New Zealand, who also took one of our machines back to New Zealand, and he said, "I want your shirt because it says Bitcoin and it says El Salvador, so people are really excited about El Salvador and Bitcoin.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah, so let's talk a little bit about some of the other things that you guys are working on. You're not just doing ATMs, you guys are focused on education. You guys believe that that's an important part of Bitcoin adoption. So give us the lowdown on some of the new things you guys have coming out.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, definitely. I mean, I think it all.. it's from our side, at least. It's an effort to help Bitcoin be accessible, and making Bitcoin Bitcoin accessible means, yes, you know, here's.. here's a nickel. You can just put the nickel in the machine and you get Bitcoin, but then it's also about creating resources, a lot of our customers, people who buy our machines, are educators. I think over half of our machines, right now, are being used by either, you know, part-time or full-time as educational machines, so we're always looking for ways to to empower these educators to make it easier for them to to share bitcoin with with the rest of the of the world people who don't know them, one of them, and the one that's on screen is Aprende Bitcoin con Crayolas, learn bitcoin with crayons. So this is an a workshop, it's about a 40 to 60 minute workshop we have created, where you just need a box of crayons and a piece of paper, on the like right now. Here we see Evelyn from Berlin. Yep, absolutely great project going on in Berlin, a Bitcoin Education Center, and I was able to lead the workshop for them, so basically we have on the on the left there we have that's our blockchain, you know, that's a blank piece of paper, and everybody in the room gets a crayon, that's your private key, you can sign blue and everybody can read blue, but nobody else can write in blue because that's your private key, the public key is just whatever you write, you sign it blue, that's your signature, but nobody else can do it, everybody can see it, nobody can copy it, just like in Bitcoin. So we do, there's about right now, I think we have like 12 exercises within, you know, from a simple private key signing, as I was describing, to a multi-signature transaction, where you have two or three colors being the recipients, and you can say, "Oh, this, I'm sending some bitcoin to blue, green, and red, and two of them can be in agreement to spend it, and then we teach people, you know, how to protect your private key, and then there are. Start, they start to be able to separate the concept of, okay, so my private key is my secret. It's not the physical hardware wallet that I have, or it's not the app that's running on my phone, you know. It's the secret is what I have to keep. So, by being, by making it tangible, people are able to to understand it and to practice it, and then you know we can even do like little if the group is too big, we can separate and say, okay, so this table is going to work on this piece of paper, so it's really approachable because the consumables are crayons, which everybody has access to, and paper, which everybody has access to, and then you can go on to really advanced concepts, so this was a really great class. I mean, kudos to the Bitcoin Berlin team. These are Salvadoran students from ages 13 and up. All of them were engaged in the class, participating. You can see that the kids feel valued, the they feel empowered to be there to share, to you know, to speak up, to say, even to make mistakes, and learn. So, there, I was really, I felt really privileged to be sharing with them. So, it was a really great class, and it's, we're preparing it in a way that can be easily reproduced in different places, and we're just making it free for everyone. It's Creative Commons, just, you know, don't go and sell it, you can just continue to reproduce it for free. Yeah.

Mike Peterson:

No, I love that. And then you also have a game.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, so this is another of the tools, and we're also sharing this with our clients who have bought some of our machines and also some of the educational projects. I have some of the game pieces here. This is a board game called Merkle Color, and the idea for this is, if you're doing a Bitcoin meetup, how do you break the ice? How do you start, or while you're waiting for everybody to show up, especially if it's in Latin America, you know? You say, 'Hey, it's at 6pm but people start coming in at 6:30 Some of them might be early. So, what do you do in the meantime? You know,

Mike Peterson:

The key is you just tell the Salvadorans a half hour before you tell everybody else. Yeah, you know that.

Edgar Borja:

But then there's some Latinos for whom it's an hour later, and then you get in trouble now. So, what we do is that we have created this board game that teaches you about Merkle trees. Merkle trees, are you know, it's an algorithm that's used by the blockchain to be able to summarize the transactions and be able to validate how can each block be validated quickly. It uses a Merkle tree algorithm, but we just make it easy. It's just colors, as you can see at the top, there's a bunch of leaves in different colors. Those key, those leaves are the mempool, so all of these are transactions that everybody can see, and you have different colors, and then your job is to find the Merkle tree branches, or just, you know, the branches, let's say, for example, in that picture we see that there's a pink and blue and green leaf at the top, so you have to find a piece that is pink and green, and that we go in the first position on the board, and then it's a speed game, I think. We played it, yeah.

Mike Peterson:

We played it at the Plan B conference, Yes, they had it in the lounge, exactly.

Edgar Borja:

And we did a tournament there. We were teaching it to people, so the thing is, you have, you have to match the first four, the first four, like the top four branches have to match the mempool. Then, in the second level, the second level of branches, they need to match the trunk from the previous, just like in a Merkle tree, you know, you hash two transactions into one value, then you hash those two values into a new one, and then you continue to do that until you get the Merkle root, which is one of the data points that's used for the, you know, who gets to mind the block first, so use using this game, you can teach the people. Okay, so you are hashing right now, which means you know, taking a lot of values and turning them into one, and if you find the last one, then that means that you mine this block, so you win one point. And then usually, you know, the game, once people get going, it can end in 30 seconds, because they're, you know, matching their pieces really quickly, and then we do several rounds at the Plan B conference. We had a tournament, we had eight people playing at the same time, you know, going against each other, and in the end we had just the two finalists, and it was really exciting, and the winner got to take, you know, their own game set for free. We were able to send also game sets to several education-focused organizations, and we're getting some good feedback from them. You know, people are using it. We wanted to make a game where you can explain the rules in 30 seconds, so it doesn't even take a minute to. Which, and then you don't need to tell them you're okay. So now we're going to talk about the algorithm and hash. You know, we had a three year old player, and she was doing well. You know, she, she was doing okay. She didn't need to know about Merkle trees. It can be just a game, but if you want to elaborate after a break in the ice, you can start telling. Okay, so this is how this connects to Bitcoin, and this is, you know, what's important about this, and why validation, and why. And then maybe you do, you know, one round of the game, and then you teach a little bit, and then you do another round, and then you teach for 15 more seconds, and it continues to keep interesting. So it's another of the tools that we're building for the people who want to build, or who want to create a Bitcoin education space.

Mike Peterson:

I love it. I love it. I love how you guys are not just focused on one thing, but you're looking at the bigger picture of it all.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, I mean, our goal is just to create tools that make Bitcoin easy to use. You know, it doesn't need to be complicated Bitcoin. I mean, cryptocurrencies in general, cryptography is very complicated. I can tell you, because you know, getting the machine to be able to work on chain and non-lighting at the same time with self-custody, it's complicated.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah,

Edgar Borja:

But we don't need it to make it complicated for people who are using it for the first time, you know? If they want to go on and be Bitcoin developers, which we need more of that's absolutely fantastic, but if they just want to use it for their daily life, and you, you know, you can contribute to making it exciting and easy to understand, and say, oh, okay, so that's how the private key works. Okay, so that's why you know you need to mine faster, and that's what you can. So then we can create tools that help just with colors, you know, none of this is language-based. The board game, of course, you know the instructions are in English and Spanish, but you can play with this. You can play this game with somebody who doesn't speak your language. You can just show them, you know, where it goes, and then you can have a multilingual board game around, and it's easy.

Mike Peterson:

I love that. So, for people who are interested in getting machines, I'm assuming you have it available in lots of different languages, lots of different currencies. I don't know if you want to give the specifics on that, but is there any, is there any major countries that you guys are not able to service, or is it? I don't know, with the different size bills and different things, if there's challenges there, but Who, who, who should buy one of these?

Edgar Borja:

Everyone, man. So, what you just mentioned is one, you know, it's one of those things. One of the major challenges for us was the size of the bills,

Mike Peterson:

Because some countries have bills that are huge.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, yes, absolutely. And you know, if you're not into, you know, vending machines and cash devices, I know you had some experience with that in a previous,

Mike Peterson:

Yeah, I had that. We had a vending part of our operations, our company was was vending, and so I know all the things that can go wrong in those, and how they get clogged up, and yeah, jammed up, and all that.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, so one of one of the biggest challenges we were able to overcome in the past six months was being able to accept wider bills, you know. This, this machine in particular is has a bill acceptor that's designed for the US dollar, so any bill that's the same size as the US dollar, you know, Mexican bills, Guatemalan, Honduran, a lot of Latin America is designed similar to the US dollar will work here, but European notes, Canadian notes, Bolivian, which was one of the issues, you know, they're wider, the yen is like an a piece of paper, no, not that big, but anyways, it's quite big. So we were able to launch, or to integrate a new bill acceptor into our machines, and that one can take almost 100 different currencies, so this one can take about eight currencies, which is, you know, it was limiting our market. Also, part of what we learned during ex-founders was, you know, you need to broaden the scope of your market. If you tell somebody, 'Hey, I'm from Canada, I want to buy a machine, oh, I'm sorry, you can't, because your bills are too wide. Investors don't like that, and absolutely, you know, as a company owner, we don't want to say that. We want to say yes, we support it. And if they say,"Hey, we in our country, the Lightning Network is not really popular, we only work on chain. Yes, we support it. So our machines can now take coins and bills from over 100 countries, and yeah, you can buy them online using Bitcoin.

Mike Peterson:

And you can switch it to the languages and the different places.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, so the software is already multilingual, and this one is, I think, six languages right now, Japanese being the most different looking. And then you know, but we continue to add languages, you know, it's just a software update. It away recently we added Portuguese, if I'm not mistaken, was the latest one. So that's coming up. It's going to be in this really soon, and it's, I mean, with AI translation is is really simple nowadays. So we continue to add languages as they are request, as they are requesting.

Mike Peterson:

Then you're able to get the currency feed into the machine for the conversion, depending on what currency they're using.

Edgar Borja:

Exactly, exactly, so the machine queries a couple of different because the machines work. Basically, one of our goals right now is for the machines to be what would be the word self governed, self reliant, not depending on any third party service, self sovereign. Yeah, I mean, actually we're trying to align with between principles even more. So the machine will query the price of Bitcoin in its program currency. In the case of Bolivia, for example, it needs to query both prices, and then you know, figure out the.. there's some options to configure there, so that you choose, you know, which, like, if you want to use the real price or the artificial price.

Mike Peterson:

The owner of the machine can.. can do that.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, yeah, absolutely. You know, there's a.. there's a dashboard for the machine where the owner decides what they said, and they continue to, we continue to build more features, just to make it, you know, any, any gap that we find that's not being served, we try, make an effort to continue to resolve those problems. I think we're, I think this machine is the first self-sovereign Bitcoin ATM in the world that works on both networks. I mean, I've done the research, we haven't seen any other. Most, most of the machines are, you know, part of a network or designed to be controlled by a central node. This is more aligned with Bitcoin principles, so we're creating tools for mass adoption at the needs to be for those tools to be reliable, for those tools to be resilient, they need to be self custody, and that's what we're building.

Mike Peterson:

I love that. So, for people who want to buy one, now, what? What's the process?

Edgar Borja:

If you want to buy one, you just go to K1.sv and then there's a shop button there, and you can select either, for example, a coin-only machine, they all look, and they have the same enclosure size, so they're all the same size, but what changes is the cash devices, so a coin-only machine,

Mike Peterson:

Will be cheaper, then,

Edgar Borja:

Will be cheaper. Yes, then there's this, is like the middle model that has the bill acceptor only for US dollar or US dollar size bills, and then the newest machine, we call it the K1 So the first one will be K1 mini, this one is K1 mini plus, and then we have the K1 mini global, which takes currencies from about 100 countries, the and that one, all three of them are available online at K1.sv

Mike Peterson:

Have you had any issues with the coin sizes in any of the countries, or is that something that's more uniform?

Edgar Borja:

You know, the coins are actually easier because the machine will detect you know the size and weight of the coins, and then the metallicity too, you know, with a little, you know, magnet like detector, and the coin, the coin acceptor can be trained on site. So, let's say that Bolivia, for example, launches a 10 bolivar coin, a 10 Boliviano coin, because the fire one is not enough, so the coin can be the coin acceptor can be retrained on site with, you know, a couple of button presses, so that part is easy. The bill acceptor is a little bit more complicated. That's actually the most complex part of the of the machine, because you know it needs to do, you know, UV scanning, IR scanning, visual light scanning, so that requires a little bit more processing, more power, so coins are easier than bills.

Mike Peterson:

That makes sense.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah,

Mike Peterson:

So they can go to the website and they can be shipped worldwide.

Edgar Borja:

Yes, we ship worldwide right now. We have shipped machines, you know. Let me see, Australia, New Zealand, we shipped some machines to Eastern Europe recently, South America as well. So, yeah, we ship all over the place, just ship the machine to Canada too. So,

Mike Peterson:

And do you guys have any issues with, with customs? I mean, they're, they're an innocuous-looking machine. I'm assuming most people wouldn't even know what they are, but I don't. Do you run into anything with it being an ATM?

Edgar Borja:

I mean, they are not technically ATMs, yeah, because we use the ATM word for shorts, but there's actually. More in the category of vending machines, an ATM, by definition, officially it's a machine that dispenses cash, so eventually, if we have, you know, the two-way machine, that will be officially an ATM,

Mike Peterson:

Okay.

Edgar Borja:

This machine, a machine where you, where you drop a coin and you get something in return, is more a vending machine.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah, I like that. Yeah, I like that, and that's also keeps it simple.

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, and then we might, we might have a cash dispensing unit, as I mentioned, a module, but this will be, you know, a vending machine.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah,

Edgar Borja:

We call it, you know, the Bitcoin candy machine. You put in $1 instead of getting a candy, you get Bitcoin.

Mike Peterson:

Yeah, I love that. I love that. So, where can people follow you and find out about new things that you guys are coming out? And then also, I'm assuming, since you're a growing company, that you guys are looking for investors. So, if investors are looking and invest in an up and coming Salvadoran company. How can they contact you? What's the best way to get a hold of you?

Edgar Borja:

I mean, if you want to follow us or reach out to us on social media, it's K1 El Salvador. We're most active on X, which is where most of the Bitcoin ecosystem moves, but we're under the same name on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, so just K1 El Salvador, or at K1 El Salvador, and if you want to reach me personally, it's Borja at K1.sv

Mike Peterson:

Okay, well, Paco, can we put that in the show notes so that people have that?

Edgar Borja:

Absolutely.

Mike Peterson:

Do we miss anything?

Edgar Borja:

Let me see what else can we talk about. We I don't know if your audience is more technical. We could go on about, you know, the challenges of doing a self custody ATM, but if that's not the well,

Mike Peterson:

I'm not very technical, so I don't really bring those issues up for the audience. We'll leave that to another day, but I would like to finish off with just your take as a Salvador and entrepreneur on the business climate in El Salvador, and is Bitcoin actually working in El Salvador? Is it bringing benefits to the people? You hear a lot of negative stuff in the press. There's even been some Bitcoiners that have moved here and then left because they've been like disillusioned and so I'm curious to hear from you as a Salvadoran what your take is on it?

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, absolutely. As a Salvadorian, I can tell you our company, our product launched on the day the Bitcoin law was announced. We traveled down here to Bitcoin Beach to test one of the Bitcoin ATMs, you know, one of the one of the shops, and after seeing the friction in that experience, we decided to create the simplest way to buy Bitcoin in the world, and we have had a good reception here in the country, mostly abroad, because Salvadorans tend to be no very, we like nobody is a prophet in their own land. Yes, so

Mike Peterson:

Yes,

Edgar Borja:

But from the whole Bitcoin ecosystem, we have had a great reception, and being from El Salvador has been beneficial to our company brand and to our to our identity. In regards to the business climate, there are challenges. El Salvador is a developing country. It's a developing economy. We right now, we have, we have raised funds from two different investors, both of them were from outside the country. The startup ecosystem is just starting to bubble here in El Salvador. We, I had the opportunity to be at the Foundry Labs meetup last week, talking to some of the startup founders that are, you know, in the, in the very initial stages, and telling them about this experience. You know, yeah, I mean, you're going to be doing the pitch. I told them they didn't believe me, but then I did the numbers for them, and then they were like, well, he's, he's real, I mean, he means that we're real. How many times I've done the K1 pitch, it's about 5000 times.

Mike Peterson:

Wow,

Edgar Borja:

Because my pitch is, you know, here's an equal, do you want free Bitcoin, and then you know lead people to the machine, so at every conference, you know, from start to finish, you know, doing it 100 times per day. We've been in over a dozen conferences, and that's how I met the investors, you know, people who are just walking around. One of them here in El Salvador, actually, both of my investors, I met them here in El Salvador because of the Bitcoin ecosystem, and you know, just from from an equal to using the machine to then if they, if it sparks some interest, explaining how it, how the business model works, how our company works, and then continue to build on the relationship. So, is it super easy? You know, nothing worth it is super easy, but if you're willing to. With the legwork, and to, and to really, you know, make an effort, being from El Salvador in the Bitcoin ecosystem is has been extremely beneficial for us.

Mike Peterson:

I love that. Any, any final words? Anything else that you want to leave people with?

Edgar Borja:

Yeah, I mean, if, if you're founding a company, you know, don't give up, it's hard, and sometimes it's not hard, sometimes it's very hard, but if you really.. one of the one.. what I was just sharing a few days ago with the Foundry Foundry Labs team, and one of the things that I learned at the ex-founders reality show, you have to fall in love with the problem you want to solve. If you fall in love with the solution you're building, I mean, you might have, you know, the greatest tech, the, you know, beautiful UI, you might have, you know, whatever you want, but if, if it doesn't solve the problem, if it doesn't fix the problem, then what you have is it's just, it's just a toy, yeah, might be good for you for a while, but then it just fizzles off. But if you fall in love with the problem you want to solve, and you work for it, and you breathe it in, and you understand how it hurts people, you know why people want this problem being solved. And then you don't, you don't care about your solution, you care about their problem, then you're just going to be empathetic to them, and you'll be able to create something that helps people. If you're helping people, people will give you money for it, because they, they want that problem solved, and you have the solution. Then you know the investment will be, will make sense, the your customers will pay you for your product, because you have built something of value. You have built wealth. You cannot make money. Well, sometimes I guess some governments can just decide to make money, but as a business founder, what you can create is wealth, and the way you create wealth is by creating something that people want. So, if you fall in love with a problem, and you, and you solve it to the best of your abilities, people will want to support you by giving you money, and that's that's the way to grow a company, and that's the way to grow, even as a person, I think, by finding people to help.

Mike Peterson:

Love it. That's a perfect note to end on. And look forward to having you back on here again next year, and hear all the new exciting things that have happened.

Edgar Borja:

Thank you. Really appreciate the opportunity.