{"id":"tyler-spalding","version":1,"language":"en","title":"Tyler Spalding","hidden":false,"content":"**Tyler Spalding** is the President of Acronym Foundation and the Co-founder of Flexa, the developer organization behind [Ampera](https://iq.wiki/wiki/ampera), a grassroots payments initiative, anchored by the AMP collateral token. [\\[1\\]](#cite-id-py3ik1u8sz)[\\[2\\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  \n$$widget0 [YOUTUBE@VID](Fk9-XbJeIQI)$$  \n  \n# Education  \n  \nSpalding attended the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign for a Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering and then he got a Master's degree in Aerospace, Aeronautical, and Astronautical Engineering from the same university in 2002. [\\[2\\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  \n  \nHe earned an MBA, Cross Registration from Harvard Business School in 2010, and afterward, he  \nattended Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for a Master's Degree in Business Administration (MBA), Entrepreneurship and Innovation. [\\[2\\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  \n  \n# Career  \n  \nTyler Spalding started his career as a Software Engineer at Microsoft followed by being a Researcher at NASA in 2004. He served as a Design Lead of the United Space Alliance and also, the United States Air Force in 2008. [\\[2\\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  \n  \nIn 2009, Spalding served as the Senior Engineer, NASA Constellation Program / Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle, and then as a Researcher at MIT until 2011. [\\[2\\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  \n  \nHe co-founded Tastebud Technologies in May 2011 and served as the CEO leading the company to be acquired by Raise in 2015. [\\[3\\]](#cite-id-izl0tr1mkeh)  \n  \n> “We’ve all recognized how aligned our business objectives were,” Spalding commented on the acquisition.  \n> “Raise not only has a massive company that’s well-capitalized with a great team of investors, but for us, knowing the team and the culture we’d be working with really sealed the deal.”[\\[3\\]](#cite-id-izl0tr1mkeh)  \n  \nSpalding served as the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Raise.com post-acquisition until 2018. [\\[2\\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  \n  \n## Flexa  \n  \nIn February 2018, he co-founded Flexa[\\[5\\]](#cite-id-wv46k4sry9l) alongside [Zachary Kilgore](https://iq.wiki/wiki/zachary-kilgore), a platform that offers omnichannel digital asset payments. It is also the company behind [Ampera](https://iq.wiki/wiki/ampera), a grassroots payments initiative that uses Amp as a digital collateral token.  \n  \nFlexa is the first use case of Amp's features as a collateral token. The Flexa Capacity contract is a collateral manager that uses Amp to collateralize the payments of merchant locations across the US and Canada. Users stake Amp in exchange for rewards funded by the merchant fees. [\\[5\\]](#cite-id-wv46k4sry9l)  \n$$widget0 [YOUTUBE@VID](nI6YEzs9_X8)$$  \n  \nIn January 2023, Spalding was appointed the President of Acronym Foundation, focusing on building open-source [Web3](https://iq.wiki/wiki/web3) projects including Anvil and [Ampera](https://iq.wiki/wiki/ampera). [\\[4\\]](#cite-id-logskok59u)  \n  \n<br>  \n<br>  \n<br>  \n","summary":"Tyler Spalding is the President of Acronym Foundation, Co-founder of Flexa, and an experienced engineer and entrepreneur with degrees from UIUC, Harvard, and MI...","categories":[{"id":"people","title":"People in crypto"}],"promoted":0,"tags":[{"id":"Founders"}],"metadata":[{"id":"references","value":"[{\"id\":\"py3ik1u8sz\",\"url\":\"https://x.com/trspalding?lang=en\",\"description\":\"X profile\",\"timestamp\":1725884416146},{\"id\":\"9pl9jsyfodf\",\"url\":\"https://www.linkedin.com/in/tylerspalding/\",\"description\":\"Linkedin profile\",\"timestamp\":1725884426413},{\"id\":\"izl0tr1mkeh\",\"url\":\"https://www.builtinchicago.org/articles/raise-tastes-its-first-acquisition-tastebud-technologies\",\"description\":\"Raise tastes its first acquisition with Tastebud Technologies\",\"timestamp\":1725885464993},{\"id\":\"logskok59u\",\"url\":\"https://acronymfoundation.org/\",\"description\":\"Acronym Foundation\",\"timestamp\":1725886184679},{\"id\":\"wv46k4sry9l\",\"url\":\"https://flexa.co/\",\"description\":\"Flexa \",\"timestamp\":1725886444395}]"},{"id":"website","value":"https://acronymfoundation.org/"},{"id":"twitter_profile","value":"https://x.com/trspalding"},{"id":"linkedin_profile","value":"https://www.linkedin.com/in/tylerspalding/"},{"id":"previous_cid","value":"QmYjBxYzaADN1dbHnrUiQ3EFic8Zh3t1ZEiaZJGdxTLTfy"}],"user":{"id":"0x212Cb3F4aE6611054637f9f78F18fB628AD258bb"},"author":{"id":"0x212Cb3F4aE6611054637f9f78F18fB628AD258bb","profile":{"username":"zainab","avatar":"QmZzhTxNPnCKWpsPJtS1YeZUiZ5vFSNHCeStpigLs2pRNt"}},"media":[{"name":"Fk9-XbJeIQI","id":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fk9-XbJeIQI","size":"0","type":null,"source":"YOUTUBE"},{"name":"sGr4VkR9zFA","id":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGr4VkR9zFA","size":"0","type":null,"source":"YOUTUBE"},{"name":"aS550VS-I14","id":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aS550VS-I14","size":"0","type":null,"source":"YOUTUBE"},{"name":"nI6YEzs9_X8","id":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nI6YEzs9_X8","size":"0","type":null,"source":"YOUTUBE"}],"views":3,"events":[],"linkedWikis":{"founders":[],"blockchains":[]},"founderWikis":[],"blockchainWikis":[],"ipfs":"QmYjBxYzaADN1dbHnrUiQ3EFic8Zh3t1ZEiaZJGdxTLTfy","transactionHash":"0x4b28927a8ee312d0959c7cfb435f2e1a7a12d8166bbbafc54fff9191f347e29c","created":"2024-09-09T12:44:55.037Z","updated":"2024-09-09T13:46:10.928Z","images":[{"id":"QmeE1ENAwaLQxL92yiRdeBxu3eyVR1Ks8BqS2ywxpwfTzC","type":"image/jpeg, image/png"}]}