Timechain Labs plans mutual funds tokenization in India

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India’s Timechain Labs, which has been educating developers and funneling talent into the BSV ecosystem, is looking to partner with mutual funds companies for tokenization.

Started by Rohan Sharan, Timechain Labs plans to partner with different issuers of financial instruments, such as mutual funds, and target their tokenization.

“The opportunity is huge for whoever is able to capture it,” Sharan told CoinGeek in an exclusive interview. 

“And the benefit is that mutual funds, once they are tokenized, you can have them used as easy collateral. Right now, a lot of paperwork (needs to be done) to be able to get a loan on top of a mutual fund and also to be able to transfer mutual funds from one depository to another,” Sharan explained.

“A lot more efficiency can happen as well as getting loans on top of mutual funds, and funds of funds can be easily created. So, all these are the possibilities and opportunities that are opening up here in the mutual funds space. And it’s going to be an opportunity for us to demonstrate the use case of blockchain yet again,” Sharan added.

For regulatory clearance, Sharan said he would have to go through the compliance process with his partners, who are the issuers, which can be time-consuming. 

“We will have to go through the regulatory clearance to be able to take this to market. We are pursuing this and it would go into the year 2026 when it would really be live,” he said.

Programs for talent development in 2025

Sharan started Timechain Labs to help transform India’s tech talent into BSV developers and entrepreneurs. 

Going into 2025, Timechain Labs is planning two programs in March: the Timechain Summer of Code and the Timechain Innovations Sprint. 

The Timechain Summer of Code 2025 is expected to be the main driver of the developer talent to be trained in India, Sharan said. Simultaneously, Timechain Labs will introduce another program in March aimed at product managers or founders looking to build on the BSV blockchain. 

“So with these two, we expect to have a good amount of talent getting trained and building applications on the BSV blockchain,” Sharan stated.

According to Sharan, there is a wide gap in developers’ understanding of different blockchains. Sharan’s programs intend to provide a lot of help so that developers can focus on learning and applying their knowledge to development.

“That kind of a program has been missing in the space, and at best, what they get is courses and the courses that they have to do at their own pace at their own time, and they don’t get the required support that they need to actually go hands-on developing an application,” Sharan explained. 

“The Innovation Sprint is a very unique offering which is to have applications built, which are actually solving a user need. This program is not for actually building anything. It’s more of customer development. You can think of it as more of a product market fit – that’s the target. It’s more of an entrepreneur-focused or product manager-focused program,” Sharan said. 

In the customer development program, Sharan wants to ensure that nobody pursues an opportunity that has no demand. This is crucial for strategizing how blockchain applications go to market and for the founders and product managers who are building them.

“Just because it’s a blockchain, it is not going to be used by customers. They don’t care about blockchain. They care more about the features, the problems that are getting solved. So figuring that out and working the business model around that…is the agenda of the Innovation Sprint, where we are truly innovating,” Sharan added.

Sharan said each product manager is expected to get 100 customers lined up to use their product when it launches. He saw about 3,000 registrations for the Summer of Code program last year, and Sharan expects about the same number this year or more.

Timechain Labs plans more education partnerships

India’s students and communities can intuitively understand the benefits of the BSV blockchain compared to other blockchains. 

“That is inspiring them to build using our solutions, which are very easy to use and develop. So, that has been a very positive uptake on how the developers perceive the BSV blockchain,” Sharan said.

However, what is lacking is that universities that are already teaching students about blockchain technology are not that well-versed in BSV. 

“So our strategy is focused on having more education partnerships with universities, and guiding them on the benefits of BSV compared to other blockchains,” Sharan said. 

Currently, Timechain Labs has four tie-ups with universities across three Indian cities, which will be expanded in 2025. Sharan is targeting universities in New Delhi, the capital city of India. 

New Delhi and the cities surrounding it are becoming centers for startups, competing with Bangalore in southern India. According to Sharan, New Delhi, being at the center, is a promising destination, and many universities are willing to partner with it.

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