The Autobiography of a Web3 Entrepreneurial Loser

About a month ago, the zkSync ecological decentralized perpetual contract protocol Phezzan Protocol notified the community of its decision to shut down the project.

As the first DeFi project to deploy perpetual contract products on the zkSync 2.0 test network, Phezzan Protocol has also iterated several versions of the product along with the technical upgrade of zkSync 2.0. However, it is embarrassing that the main network was officially launched and renamed on zkSync 2.0 Shortly after the zkSync Era, the Phezzan Protocol, which had high hopes, came to a premature end of failure.

articlearticle, the article reflects on the experience and lessons learned from the failure of Phezzan Protocol. The content covers financing, team building, community operation, etc. It may be useful for entrepreneurs who are also working in the Web3 field. A certain revelation.

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About Products

Roland mentioned that Phezzan Protocol started in early 2022, but after 15 months of development, there is still no viable network product. The center of gravity has been shifted many times—for example, I wanted to adopt the AMM model at first, but later found that it was difficult for AMM to solve the problem of impermanent losses, and VCs were not interested in AMM, so they turned to the order book model, but found it difficult to contract with other order books Protocols make a difference.

The lesson Roland draws from this is that,secondary title

About financing

The financing of Phezzan Protocol lasted for more than a year, and also received support from some VC and angel investors, but overall it was not successful. Lessons Roland learned along the way include:

1. You need to have the ability to tell a good story.You need to communicate your vision clearly to VCs, and if they can't understand your idea, let alone users.

2.Networking is very important.Since there were no full-time Crypto practitioners in the Phezzan Protocol team before, the relationship network in the industry was not well developed, so the team had to contact potential investors through various public social media channels.

3. Find the right lead investor first.The Phezzan Protocol team spent a lot of time contacting various investment institutions, but finally realized that it is more important to find a leading investment institution first, and an excellent leading investment institution can greatly speed up the financing process.

4. Timing is important.Phezzan Protocol originally wanted to start financing when the testnet made important progress to prove its strength to VC, but after the Rinkeby testnet was launched, Terra crashed, and after the zkSync 2.0 testnet was launched, it encountered a FTX storm... So If you can't judge the market trend, then get financing as soon as possible, as time goes by, things will change.

5. Talk to VCs more.secondary title

about the community

Roland gave a metaphor that building a community before a product fits the market is like building a sand castle. You may have a lot of fun, but it doesn't necessarily lead to a good ending.

so,

so,You need to forget the community at the beginning of the launch and focus on the productsecondary title

About BD

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about the team

Phezzan Protocol assembled a great team and the engineers executed the team's ideas perfectly.

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about yourself

You need to be kind to yourself, which is especially important for all entrepreneurs.

Roland said: “In Phezzan Protocol’s entrepreneurial journey, we always think about the mistakes we made and how we can do better; we worry about the past, present and future; It’s not a good state of mind to be in charge of things. This pressure consumes us, consumes us.”

So please be kind to yourself, take a break if you need it, and have a life outside of work, learn to enjoy the process of starting a business.

As for salary, don’t be too demanding on yourself with a salary cut. Roland’s salary during the construction of Phezzan Protocol is only 20% -30% of the past, which also affects his daily life. Investors don't care how much money you make as a founder, as long as you don't make crazy money.