Galia Benartzi was born to Israeli parents in Palo Alto, California. Where she lived until middle school when she moved back to Israel.
Galia Benartzi is one of the co-founders of Banco, the world’s first open-source protocol to ensure on-chain liquidity between blockchain-based assets.
She describes herself as a technology entrepreneur, currently working on a cryptocurrency protocol called Bancor.
Early life and professional career
Galia completed her BA in Comparative Literature from Derthmount College and MA in International Economics from SAIS Johns Hopkins.
In the earlier years of her professional career, Galia has been involved with several projects whose details are given below.
One of the initial ventures co-founded by her was the company Mytopia, a one of it’s kind social gaming platform for smartphones which was later acquired by the company ‘888’.
In 2010 she was involved with a cross-platform development technology for mobile applications called Particle Code, which was also later acquired by another company called ‘Appcelerator’.
Between 2012 and 2013 she was known to be part of a Founders Fund in which she was a venture partner along with Peter Thiel.
While she was a part of the Fund she helped with her contribution to the firm’s investment strategies and worked with many influential companies like SpaceX, Facebook, and Airbnb.
In 2017, Galia Benartzi co-founded Bancor, a cryptocurrency conversion business. In the same year, Bancor created the Automated Market Maker, which serves as a foundational element for Decentralized Finance (DeFi).
It was one of the first decentralized trading protocols in the market at that time. The company has a record of converting across 120 Ethereum-based currencies totalling more than $2 billion in worth.
Miscellaneous activities, recognitions, and public appearances
Throughout her career, she has been awarded the recognition for being among the Top 50 women in Tech in 2018.
She was featured on BloombergTV and CNBC and has spoken at the United Nations.
She has taken up stages like TEDX and Oslo Freedom Forum relating to monetary theories and innovation.
She has also given speeches at events like Tech Open Air 2018, Crypto Investor Show London, CapitalFest, TNW NEW YORK, and South Summit Madrid 2019.
On top of all these, she was also reportedly an Advisor to the Fan Controlled Football(FCF)
These are only a few of the countless initiatives that she has taken up in her long career which spanned most of her life.
Personal Philosophy
Throughout her professional career as well as through her personal life Galia was a person who sought to empower individuals and communities through her innovative ventures and community-oriented contributions.
She was hit with the realization of how money works in the economy when the recession hit back in 2008 while she was studying for her master’s in international relations and economics in Bologna, Italy.
This gave her the reason to take up the job to bring stability and balance to the economy by giving more power to the people who were involved in the system rather than the Elite bankers and government officials who called the shot as to how and who should get how much and when.
This was what seemed to have shaped her moral standings and philosophy towards money, people, and her moral responsibility toward the world.
Bancor was one of the initiatives that helped her realize this dream and brought it to fruition.
She has worked at the forefront of many fundraising initiatives that have benefitted a large number of people.
Her vision for the future envisages a society where we can fully utilize the potential of AI to build a more sustainable and cooperative society to thrive and grow.
Final Thoughts
Galia Benartzi’s vision for a better future extended beyond the limits of technology and finance.
Even amongst the other important figures in the business world and the world of technology, it would be hard to find someone who had such an impressive track record as she did.
Her passion and energy for all the work that she took charge of is something that everyone who aspires to be a successful individual must try to strive for.
We will conclude this article with words from Galia Benartzi herself: “You are allowed to question everything around you, and you’re allowed to be bold”
So keep on questioning and always be bold.
