In marketing strategy, the concept of a “first-mover advantage” describes an innovator that’s first to launch a novel product, good, or service within a given sector.
The benefits enjoyed by the first mover generally include: widespread brand recognition within the space; dominant market share; production economies of scale; enhanced customer loyalty; preferred distribution channels; price setting flexibility and more.
However, simply being the first to do something does not guarantee sustained success. For example, Kodak invented the first digital camera. MySpace developed the first social media platform. Napster deployed the first music sharing service. The first Internet browser was Netscape. Tivo created the original digital video recorder.
None of those companies are leaders today within those fields. Each of those first-movers stumbled over a critical obstacle – failing to continue to innovate.
That’s not the case for a first mover within the crypto space, Simplex.
“Simplex was founded in 2013. We enable exchangers, brokers, and digital wallets to be able to accept credit card payments for users buying crypto with a ‘zero chargeback guarantee.’ If you’ve purchased crypto using your credit card, it has most likely been done through us,” said Simplex co-founder, Nimrod Lehavi, in his exclusive interview with DailyCoin.
Simplex is an EU-licensed financial institution, providing the fiat infrastructure for the cryptocurrency industry. Simplex processes crypto-to-credit card payments with a unique 100% guarantee – if a fraudulent chargeback occurs, the merchant gets paid by Simplex.
“We started with credit card processing, offering a zero chargeback guarantee baked into that so there’s no risk for the merchant accepting the credit card. That’s a big deal for business owners, and we’re doing it all in-house so it’s not a subsidy or a service that might vanish one day,” Lehavi said.
Indeed, Simplex has not vanished but has thrived.
Since launching, Simplex has continued to innovate and transform itself. It has actively built and added services that enable Simplex to serve a very large variety of clientele.
“So if you don’t want to sell your own liquidity, we can assist with the liquidity. If you don’t want a bank account we can pay you in crypto. If you want to do your own ‘Know Your Customer’ verification, we can take your KYC. If you don’t want to do it we can take care of that as well. We can even open a bank account either for you as a company or an individual.
Additionally, we recently became a principal member of the Visa (NYSE:V) network, so we’re able to issue debit cards for our partners' users. Over time we continued to build and add more and more services,” he said.
Currently, its tech enables the purchase of more than 95 cryptocurrencies through Simplex’s network, including more than 50 fiat currencies to date.
Lehavi says his organization is continually striving to improve itself in the current moment, so that it’s primed to thrive in the next moment.
“We were the first movers into the market. I think there are different companies competing in different slices of the business. Nobody’s competing with us as a whole, but there’s a company or a couple companies competing with us in the credit card business, a couple of companies competing in the card issuing, some companies on the banking side of things. But we’re the only ones providing the full suite of services,” Lehavi said.
On The Flipside
- The crypto-space continues to be a hotbed of innovation and tech development.
- For Simplex and other “OGs” to survive and thrive, they must anticipate where the market is moving and be there first to meet it.
You can watch the full interview here:
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