The co-founding team of BuyBitcoin.ph, a buy and sell site for the cyptocurrency in the Philippines, is spread all over the world. Lasse Birk Olesen, the startup’s chief product officer, is based in Copenhagen, Denmark; chief technology officer Daniel Walton lives in San Francisco, California; only half of the team is actually based in Manila, Philippines, and even then CEO Sam Kaddoura and designer James Florentino see each other infrequently as they maintain completely virtual offices.
This arrangement was not entirely by design. The four met at a Bitcoin meetup in Manila and recognized an opportunity. Olesen explains:
During that time, there wasn’t any local Bitcoin exchange yet, so we’ve decided to start working together on a company that answers the question ‘Where can I buy and sell Bitcoin in the Philippines?’
The exchange launched in January this year to initial success. It allows users to buy Bitcoin by depositing cash at any one of the major banks in the Philippines. For those who want to sell Bitcoin, the BuyBitcoin team deposits the going rate in cash into their bank accounts.
Not long after BuyBitcoin’s launch, Olesen and Walton had to return home. Walton had
only intended to stay in the Philippines just long enough to get their exchange off the ground. He would only return to Manila for occasional visits as necessary. Olesen, for his part, had to give greater attention to the exchange he established a few years earlier, Bitcoin Nordic.
Rather than view Bitcoin Nordic as an entirely different endeavor, Olesen counts it as BuyBitcoin’s European sister in that it might help them reach out to investors, companies, and influencers in the region. Olesen hopes that Bitcoin Nordic could help BuyBitcoin form partnerships in Europe and the Middle East, which are important remittance channels for Filipinos who work overseas.
Their departures did not come at an opportune time. Competing exchange Coins.ph launched in February and received strong traction from both individual Bitcoin users and partner merchants. How could the BuyBitcoin team keep pace with competitors if they were halfway around the world from one another?
It helped that the BuyBitcoin team had been anticipating the separation for some time.
According to Olesen:
We knew from the beginning that some team members would not be able to stay in the Philippines all the time, and knowing each others’ dedication to bringing Bitcoin mainstream, the physical distance between us has worked very well. In fact, our global reach for partnerships is a big advantage.
The distance, at the very least, has not affected their Philippine strategy. In June 2014, the BuyBitcoin team reached a deal with online payment service provider Dragonpay that allows Filipinos to buy Bitcoin directly from their site. This service is much more convenient than the previous option of having to pay for Bitcoin over the counter at banks. This move is significant because it gives the ‘underbanked’ access to Bitcoin from all corners of the Philippines.
See: How a startup is driving Bitcoin adoption with selfies in the Philippines
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