From Machines to Code | Switched Gears into Tech - Alumni Spotlight EP5: Olorunsogo Banwo

Coming to web three bridge was like a risk for me. Why? I had to leave three jobs. Yeah. Before coming to E3 bridge, I didn't know what that was.

I thought Ethereum was Ethereum. I didn't know Ethereum is the blockchain. It's like a currency and stuff. I didn't know. So according to web was like coming with an open mind.

You think we would have like a role to play in all of this thing or like in all of what you've become to be? Definitely beat has like not a role as in they had all the role to play. We were told to apply for the incubation. We applied and we completed the incubation and we Yeah. Awesome.

So hostess is built on this. Yes. Awesome. You see it as a big group and you're laughing. Bounding and coounding is like a whole game and right because yes we are developers but the business aspect of things something different.

Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of Aluminite Spotlight. Today we have co-founder hostess in the house. So how about you do us the honors of introducing yourself again? My name is Alan Shug Bangu a software developer and co-founder host it which is a event ticketing platform on the blockchain where organizers can easily come create an event in minutes and attendees can attend their events seamlessly using paying with that fiat or crypto. M I think at the end of the day everything that a developer is doing is trying to make life as seamless as it can be.

All right. So before we get like into it I want to ask the question if not um tech or let's say shog is not a developer. What would shog have been? If I was not a developer, I would have been a mechanical engineer cuz um I studied mechanical engineering school stressful but I did mechanical engineering and um after school I worked at a mechanical engineering firm an infrastructure farm where we the red line metro stations in Lego state. So yeah, I see I have become a mechanic engineer and I was doing well.

We doing well. Doing well. Okay. If we doing well in mechanical engineering, why did you decide to transition into tech? Yeah.

Um I just felt um I was not um liking what I was doing. I was doing it well. I'm someone that if you put me anywhere, I'll definitely do it. Oh, but enjoying what I was doing was not there. I was interacting with different um um different people but I was not still feeling myself because what really turned me off is standing under the sun under trains looking at the break at different parts of trains and that's not what I wanted to do.

So I felt like the soft boys like in the house do what I need to do. That's about it. I'm exclusive, right? I've not told anybody this before. But I wanted to do maths, pure maths before, right?

Pure math. But the way you know how family can be that you have to study a professional course or this. I was I just went for mechanical engineering because I wanted to do engineering but mechanical is the father of engineering that's what I had I had to do engineering but I wasn't feeling myself math courses I aced most of them but engineering courses I also them it's not like I didn't them but I didn't feel like this is what I want to do full time. So how did your um tech journey start? Like was there like a particular person who introduced you to tech?

How did it begin? So during co right 2020 2020 I was supposed to start um my journey into tech. My brother encouraged me I was not just cut out for um that at that point in time. Okay. So um during COVID instead of learning tech most of my guys still they invited me that we should learn together but instead of learning I opted to go and anchor at a um generator um I was like one of the biggest mem yes I was an intern at GMG where in the after sales department where we go service generators around Lagos state.

So I was doing mechanical engineering basically until 500 level second semester where told myself no this is not what I actually want to do. So I just opted to I told my friend that I wanted to go into tech and he advised me told me all um all the parts of tech and I should decide then I and I started since then I've not looked back. No, that was 2020 2022 January. Yeah. So would you see like you regret the decision you made to transition into tech or what is it or would you have like preferred just if you remained as a mechanical engineer?

I didn't regret it at all at all. That's great. I I can't imagine myself. I agree. Okay.

I get that. That's there. So how did you um stumble or how did you hear about web three bridge and how did your journey with web three bridge begin? Okay my journey with web three bridge was a was a nice one actually. How did I so when I transitioned into tech I was into tech.

I was president of my department in school. Cool. So I had the opportunity to meet with the president of the lag which is Billy Kiss. She was an alumni of bread. So we spoke.

She was into tech also at that point. So we were speaking then she told me about um bridge. So she was the one that actually sent me the link and you to register for because she was nine. Okay. So so I think at that time you had already like added your web two journey.

Yeah. Yeah. I was already working at that point. Well that's great. So now let's talk about web three bridge.

When you came into Bethro Bridge, before you came into Bridge, what what was like the idea? What did you have in mind? What did you hope to achieve? Um, coming into three bridge was like a risk for me. Why?

I had to leave three jobs. Yeah. I was in I told you I was doing my mechanical engineering. Yeah. But I was also doing um side jobs.

Not side jobs. It was full time was but not um on site. Okay. Okay. So I was doing two other jobs by the side which was development.

Coming to web3 I had to talk a few of them. Interesting. I told my brother I was going to web three. He was like are you sure? Are you sure?

I said yes. He actually took Mr. um LinkedIn his name went to LinkedIn checked it out looked at me and said they looked legit but I was just finishing my at that point so he just said you can take it as you are done with NS when you finish NS you can just take 4 months out and um um just go and coming to a 3B I actually wanted to I resigned but um the HR said no I shouldn't resign I should take 4 months leave of absence. Oh wow. So to go and learn something I took the 4 months then after that I didn't go for Oh my Oh god.

Let's see. First of all we talk about your journey here at web three bridge. I feel like it took like a whole lot of inking sacrifice cuz giving up three jobs to start something when you know like you're not going to be earning money and all of that. What was it like cuz like you're already earning money right before you like came to reprior. So knowing like oh you will not be making money or you not be earning money for a while.

What was like the whole feeling like what was the process like? It was tough. It was tough because it was very tough cuz my brothers not just one two they were like they were like I'm sure am I sure? And they were just offering me a contract at was working a new contract to sign but I said no no no I don't want to do this. I I didn't want to do it.

So I just felt coming to the T would be the best decision for me. And um looking at um an online looking at going to their Twitter, their LinkedIn and stuff. I was like okay I feel this should work. Yeah. That's why I came to Bridge.

So would you say that it worked for you? Maybe. Definitely. Definitely. All right.

So now let's talk about your journey bridge. What was it like? You're an on-site student. That's me. So, what was it like?

The whole thing with like coming to meet new people, staying with new people and all of that. What was the experience like? I I actually loved it because uh staying with people, it was just like a no setting. Yeah. Again, from school.

So coming here I met people that are very good much more than I am and I could learn from and our mentors were very handsome right our mentors were very handsome that's something I really liked and the fact that I was on site I was forced to do certain things that if I was online I wouldn't do honestly I see so I heard Uh you were like part of like say like the media team head of gist and I also heard you were notorious sleeper. Is that true? I was notoriously sleeping. Sleeping. Mhm.

Ah who told you that? No don't worry about that. So I heard that you were like among the top five during like after the eviction test. I'm not going to like say but did you think did you see that coming? Cuz you mentioned that oh you came here and you met people who were like way better than you but you like still made top five during the eviction test.

Do you like did you see that coming? Honestly, I didn't see it coming cuz during the test I was I was tested because I didn't want to go after 6 weeks. Honestly, I didn't want to go because leaving home telling them and coming to after 6 weeks I'll come back and say I've been evicted. Do you get No, not leaving home. Leaving three jobs then coming and say you evicted.

That would have been like a whole lot. Yes. So I just I did my best and I love the rest. I I think you did well. I think you did.

So let's quickly talk about the whole learning. So like everything that you would imagine that you wanted to learn as a web developer coming into web 3 bridge. Do you think they provided you with like all the necessary learning like everything you needed to be like a solid web developer? Yes. Basically web three bridge is like I taking you through the basics of web 3 as a word.

Fun fact before coming to web 3 bridge I didn't know what it was. I thought Ethereum was I didn't know Ethereum is the blockchain it is like the currency and stuff. I didn't know. So coming to every was like coming with an open mind. I didn't have any knowledge about three and everything.

First time my first contact with three was like the pre-content um um documents they sent to our meals when we were applying. So basically it was a whole new experience for me. I didn't have crow knowledge. Mhm. who teaching me the basics of um web three performance was nice then the meaning was in my hands better myself if I didn't better myself I mean but what was taught in which is just the basics have a solid foundation on it exactly I think there's something Mr.

Israel would always say you say web three is the foundation like before you get to university or secondary school you have to go through primary school right so web three breed is like the primary school if you're going to be that's awesome so let's talk about hosted right as a co-founder of hosted why why why hosted of everything I mean how did you come to think about oh you want to create like an event platform and all of that so let's talk about hosted hosted was actually final project oh web. Awesome. Yeah. So my team and I we built host it. Um we built it.

It was given to us by the management as like for us. So okay, we built it out, tested it. It was nice. Right. Then we applied for the AATON, right?

like the night before which was built on OP or great optimism but we saw the opportunity to apply for the lyrics and the yakata was going to finish the next night right but since is on OP and it's basically almost the same thing you just had to change how PCs and um deploy on leaks and change our back end to this thing so we deployed we did everything applied for the that night, the night before the end of the about 2 hours before that's when we applied. I I didn't even um have any expectation. I just went to sleep and stuff. So I'm out three weeks later. So we got the mail that we were back and it was nice.

Since then we continue building. We were told to apply for the leaks incubation. We applied and we competed with incubation and we're here. Awesome. So, hostess is built on list.

Yes. Awesome. So, what exactly does hosted do? Well, uh most it is basically event ticketing. Okay.

On the blockchain event ticket on the blockchain. Okay. So what we are doing is really made for f for the land um event right and our contracts have like an escop part where if an event is cancelled or does not hold right um the money you use to get tickets will you will be funded to the users oh awesome that's very back automatically seamlessly so basically that's what we Yeah, that was that's that's really awesome. So, Tusa, how's it been? Co-ounding like this this brand, how's it been?

And I asked you I said do CEOs do they go broke? Are you laughing? Uh founding and confounding is like a whole total argument because yes we are developers. Yeah. But the business aspect of things Yeah.

something different. To be a developer is one thing. Everything has been done for you. The product side of the business business side of the product, everything has been done. It's just for you to change um turn this um product ideas into Figma designs into code and that's it.

But becoming a founder, yeah, they have to learn the product side, business side, go to market, the lots of things, revenue model and the likes that if I was working in a company, I would those ones would have been set to just me typing my keyboard and say lot a lot. So we had to learn that from the incubation with Lisk. Okay. Which was very very helpful and we had to figure out the business side of our product entirely and it's been a good ride since last year and to move forward better. I mean that's the goal.

Well done. Honestly I want say you are doing like really really amazing. So I want to like quickly say because you just mentioned oh you learned all of these things from the L incubation. So you know was was saying like shout out to shout out to L. All right great.

So do you think web three bridge like had a role to play in all of this thing? Like you said this host was like your project right so do you think web three bridge had like a role to play in all of this thing all like in all of what you've become today? Definitely they play bit as like not a role the role the role as in they had all the role to play. So us were just we giving the project like I said it's not like we came up with the project was given to us and we just had to build it out figure the rest out by ourselves. Yeah.

So all my co-ounders alumnome we in the hotel together build this platform together from scratch and um beach has been awesome anytime we need anything or maybe we need a help or stuff with our platform figuring out the business side or product side we can easily reach out to Mr. Mr. He has been very helpful during this proc gave us the platform. Repe was the first event we hosted Lagos conference 24 right. We said that um we had lots of fractions on our platform just from that event.

The event gave us like a validation. So awesome. Awesome. So now I want to ask like quick advice to people who decide cuz you mentioned like oh you were doing mechanical engineering and it was not something you really wanted to do or in a process of doing it realize oh this is not me so I need to transition into something else. So for people who are like already into like one thing or the other and they feel like oh they want to transition but they really or maybe like they are scared or they do not know how to what advice would you like have to give those set of people happy.

So basically um advice it's going to be hard and I'll lie to you and it's going to take your time and fonts you need to have fun some because you can easily go back if you don't have fun because that's the way if you want to transition take the boot step if you if you are in the right um place when it comes to like reserve funding reserves, right? If you're in the right place, you can take the step. But if the funding is not yet there, you don't have the reserve yet, calm down. Calm down. Have that reserve and take the B step.

Take the B step. Do you think like is that you get to a point where you think it's too late to like transition? Ah, definitely. It's not too late. It's not too late.

It's not too late. And I'm not too I think I'm I'm your story is very motivating, guys. I'm going to transition the class. I'm going to become a developer. That's really great to go.

I'm going to say like I like I appreciate like how how much you've come to be able to leave three jobs behind and decide to like learn in like web three. That's like a whole lot of like that's like that's a lot. I say well done and I really wish to see hosted at the bigger and and side. Thank you very much for being here today. We are grateful to have you guys.

We just wrapped up another amazing episode with the co-founder hosted. Do not forget to leave a like, a comment, and if you've not subscribed, hit that subscribe button now. We'll catch you on our next episode. Until later. Bye.

I go say bye.