Making Blockchain Safe for Institutions with Andrej Benčić (Episode 55)

Episode page and notes: https://buildersinfintech.ai/podcast/episode-55

In this episode, I sit down with Andrej Benčić, co-founder and CEO of Tenderly.

Tenderly is a blockchain development and operations platform built around the Ethereum ecosystem. Founded in 2018 in Belgrade, it started as a debugger that explained why a transaction failed and now provides simulation infrastructure, monitoring and developer tooling for teams building on-chain, from protocols to financial institutions managing capital. Tenderly has raised $58.6M, most recently a $40M Series B led by Spark Capital in 2022, with Accel and Point Nine Capital backing its earlier rounds.

Andrej, a software engineer by background, founded Tenderly with Bogdan Habić, Miljan Tekić and Nebojša Urošević after years of building projects together at hackathons.

We talk about how simulation helps developers, products and institutions manage on-chain risk, why the space needs adoption more than new innovation right now, raising in 2021, navigating bear markets, Ethereum as the "JavaScript of blockchain", a multi-chain future, stablecoins and the digital euro, and hiring talent globally.

00:00 Intro 00:23 Andrej and Tenderly 01:38 Starting Tenderly at hackathons 03:02 From transaction debugger to simulation infrastructure 06:39 Selling to developers, then to institutions 09:17 Building the simulation product 11:33 How companies use simulation 14:48 Fintech use cases: managing on-chain risk 17:22 Adoption vs innovation in blockchain 24:01 The highest high and the lowest low 26:29 Raising in 2021 and working with investors 30:43 Trends worth watching 32:25 Privacy and digital identity 33:59 Ethereum, Canton and Solana 36:27 Bank-built chains and a multi-chain future 38:48 Where stablecoins fit 40:35 The digital euro 42:35 Customers across the US and Europe 44:15 Hiring talent globally 45:12 Advice for new founders