From Candy for a Cause to Blockchain for Good: What a 7-Year-Old Taught Me About Impact

What do bags of candy, a borrowed crown, and real-world blockchain applications have in common? Turns out — quite a lot.

This is the story of how growing up in Austria shaped my values around fairness, trust, and doing good — and how those values led to the creation of SEND.SOCIAL.

Because global giving is broken, and we believe it's time to fix it.

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EARLY START TO IMPACT CREATION

Me at 7 years old, dressed up as "wise man", collecting donations and candy

When I was seven years old, I was part of our local church community in rural Austria. Every January, kids would dress up as the Three Wise Men and go door to door, singing songs and collecting donations for people in need — and sweets for ourselves. It felt like the perfect deal: doing good and getting candy.

The church council would pick a cause or a community in the global South to support. Weeks or months later, we’d see a photo of an oversized check being handed over somewhere far away. I always believed everyone involved acted with the best intentions—but the link between our donations and the real-world impact felt really distant.

That same feeling still exists in many donation systems today. And the truth is: trust alone is no longer enough. We need to verify. Everyone who contributes—whether through donations or taxes — deserves to know what’s happening with their money.

TRUST, BUT VERIFY

Me, 39 years old, teaching to "tokenize what makes sense" at the University of Liechtenstein

Fast forward a few decades: I had just founded 89Ventures, a company focused on venture building and advisory in blockchain and Web3. Before that, I had worked at a marketplace for tokenized financial products, where I learned the ins and outs of financial product structuring, tokenization, and the practical challenges of bridging traditional finance with blockchain. Along the way, I completed a certificate program in Blockchain and FinTech and now teach Applied Tokenization at the University of Liechtenstein.

Being surrounded by brilliant minds—students and lecturers alike—has been deeply inspiring. Understanding the beauty of decentralization, trustless systems, and smart contracts sparked a new obsession: building blockchain use cases that actually make a difference.

Liechtenstein is a great place for that. The country embraced regulatory clarity early with the Blockchain Act in 2020. Add its political stability and history of innovation, and it’s the perfect environment for building real-world Web3 applications.

CONNECTING WORLDS

Connecting impact and technology

It was around this time I met Biju, a medical geneticist and executive at the Health Innovation Exchange, a Geneva-based UN initiative that connects governments, innovators, and health experts to bring healthcare to those who need it most. Biju was actively exploring blockchain applications. We connected immediately over the idea that blockchain could be used to maximize the impact of healthcare delivery.

From the start, we saw something big in front of us: a way to connect two powerful worlds—cutting-edge technology and real-world need. That vision became the seed of SEND.SOCIAL.

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👋 To be continued in Part 2: the broken state of global aid, our belief in code-based transparency, and how SEND.SOCIAL plans to change the game.