XYO, the technology bringing blockchain to the real world, continues to augment its Board of Advisors and cement its leadership role by today announcing that parent company XY - The Persistent Company has made additions to the Advisory Board with the following widely-respected industry experts. James DeBello, former Chairman and CEO, Mitek; openAPI expert Adam Altman; and marketing luminary Sam Markowitz will support XY and XYO’s drive to bridge blockchain and dApps with the physical world. The company is currently building out a robust ecosystem of applications, partners and customers across industries, globally.

XYO is launching aggressively into 2019, building on an unprecedented year for the team, including growth from 17 to 80 employees, listings on multiple new exchanges, the opening of innovation-focused XY Labs in Carlsbad, CA, and partnerships with industry-leading organizations Spaceflight Industries, Esri, and the FedEx Research Institute.

XYO is pleased to announce the newest Advisory Board members. Each is an industry leader bringing a unique skill set, network, background, and strategic insights to the Board:

James DeBello

DeBello, who recently served for 15 years as Chairman, President and CEO of Mitek Systems, is a fintech visionary with over 25 years’ experience in senior executive management for global technology companies. He specializes in leading high-growth companies developing transformative information technologies which have helped shape our modern culture ranging from the infancy of Wi-Fi, to Wireless Telecom and Mobile Document Capture. He is best known as the co-inventor of mobile check deposit used by 80 million consumers and the top banks in the world. Frequently invited to speak at industry events, and a recent panelist at Mobile World Congress with PayPal and Google discussing digital inclusion, DeBello is an industry thought leader on identity and mobile computing, as well as a passionate advocate on the topic.

Adam Altman

Adam Altman is a successful serial entrepreneur, founder and investor in multiple business. Altman currently serves as CEO of Austin-based ILABS. Since he founded the organization in 2012, Altman has been the President of Rebilly, a SaaS company which helps merchants leverage card-on-file billing automation and analytics to maximize customer lifetime value. Additionally, in 2017, Altman spun out a new company, Redocly, now a leader in ReDoc OpenAPI documentation software, and currently in use by thousands of enterprises. Earlier, In 2000, Altman co-founded Traffic Marketplace, then one of the largest ad networks globally, which was ultimately sold to Vivendi Universal. Altman graduated from Claremont McKenna with a bachelor's degree in Economics in 1998.

Sam Markowitz

Markowitz, founder and CEO of The Sam Markowitz Group, is an entrepreneur who helps other successful entrepreneurs grow their businesses further. As one of the world’s top direct response copywriters and marketing strategists, he is known as Gary Halbert’s last direct protégé. Markowitz is renowned for developing successful hyper-growth marketing strategies for his clients.

XYO also recently announced the appointment of long-time Advisory Board member Paul Hynek to Advisory Board Chairman. Hynek holds an MBA from The Wharton School, and is currently a professor of finance at Pepperdine. Hynek leads the Technology Committee for the $100 million effort to revitalize Pershing Square, the oldest public space in Los Angeles, and is also a member of the global-oriented Smart Cities Council. Hynek brings significant business and technology insight, leadership and experience to his direction of the Advisory Board as XYO continues execution against an aggressive business strategy.

“With these and our other recent Advisory Board appointments, we’re building out the industry’s ‘dream team’ from various key disciplines that will help us take our business and movement to the next level,” said Markus Levin, Co-Founder and Head of Operations with XYO. “Our growing Advisory Board rounds out an already-powerful team that we expect to set the direction for the industry. Our team’s goal is to build bridges between blockchain, virtual and real worlds, and to take the our efforts into space in earnest. You can expect to see great things from XYO in 2019.”

About XYO

XYO is an effort to create a vast, geospatial, blockchain-powered location network currently under development with the goal to provide accurate, certainty-driven location data on everything from cars to smartphones. By combining location beacons with IoT and mobile devices, the XYO ecosystem plans to deliver the verified coordinates and data needed to execute smart contracts, run smart cities, foster financial transactions, and power a legion of location-centric applications. For more information, please visit https://xyo.network.