The battle to reshape to existing landscape of bitcoin protocol influencers has gained a new ally—leading bitcoin researcher Jon Matonis.
Matonis, who refers to himself as an e-money researcher, is credited for creating the first and leading general price index for bitcoin called the Bitcoin Price Index (BPI). He is also known for founding the Bitcoin Foundation, which served as the industry’s first non-profit trade association originally chartered to provide financial compensation for voluntary protocol code developers and to promote the vision of bitcoin worldwide.
This time, Matonis has joined bitcoin technology research and development outfit nChain as its new vice president for corporate strategy.
“It is imperative that we move towards a status quo where the actual protocol standard is separated from its primary reference implementation, similar to the existing architecture of the Linux kernel and its low-level abstraction layer,” Matonis said in a statement.
nChain is seeking to form a neutral standards organization that will coordinate and manage the bitcoin protocol and technical standards, which, in the long term, will result in a more robust software design and a flourishing of compatible implementations.
“The gradual elimination of trusted third parties from our economic and legal infrastructures belies a serious and unprecedented reorganisation of many legacy social structures. The winners will be those select individuals and entities that finally liberate themselves from the current centralising, rent-seeking chokepoints. I am excited to work with nChain to support growth of the blockchain ecosystem for everyone’s benefit,” Matonis said.
Matonis’s work with nChain will see him supporting the outfit’s business growth by developing commercial relationships, evaluating opportunities for strategic investments and acquisitions as well as provide his insights on blockchain technology.
“Jon was immediately attractive to nChain. During his notable career, he has consistently led the integration of financial services and cryptography. His work has included foreign currency trading for Visa International, financial platform sales for RSA’s VeriSign—securing its first $5 million in revenue—and end-to-end encrypted messaging for Hush Communications where as CEO he recruited PGP’s Phil Zimmermann as Hushmail’s Chief Cryptographer,” said nChain Holdings Limited director Arthur Davis.
Aside from being a widely-recognized bitcoin researcher, Matonis’s career has also included senior roles with Sumitomo Bank, VISA International, VeriSign and Hushmail. Matonis was named Person of the Year by Digital Gold Currency Magazine in 2011. Four years later, he was appointed to the editorial board for cryptocurrency and blockchain technology journal Ledger in 2015. Currently, he is noted on the lists for both the Top 100 Fintech Influencers and the Top 100 Blockchain Insiders in the Crypto Sphere.
