Peter Kim is a freelance researcher and Scrypto developer known for creating multiple award-winning Scrypto packages on the Radix network.
Kim currently serves as the chief technology officer and co-founder of Radix startup EmberFlow.
Overview
He first became interested in blockchain technology after learning about decentralized finance (DeFi) and believing it could help realize his vision for a more equal society, which he refers to as a "just utopia".
Despite having no prior coding experience, Kim taught himself Scrypto development over the course of two months in early 2022. He went on to become a prolific contributor, authoring three packages - NeuRacle, GroundFinance, and Align. For his work on Align, a package for creating decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs), Kim won first place out of 12 entrants in Radix's Scrypto DAO Challenge.
Education
Kim graduated in 2014 from Vietnam's National Economics University (NEU) with a bachelor's degree in International Economics. His studies focused specifically on global economics and provided him with critical thinking skills in finance, banking, trade, and economic modeling that inform his perspective on blockchain's potential.
Though Kim did not have a technical background from his college studies, he demonstrated resourcefulness and perseverance in self-teaching programming to realize his goals. After learning of the Radix network and Scrypto in late 2021, he systematically worked through documentation and code examples until gaining proficiency in building his own Scrypto packages within two months. Kim credits his conceptual understanding of assets and components from prior economics coursework with enabling him to effectively grasp Scrypto's asset-oriented programming paradigm.
Career
After completing his economics degree, Kim worked for two years as a freelance blockchain researcher beginning in 2020. He studied various blockchain and crypto projects in depth during this time, eventually discovering Radix and becoming convinced of its potential to enable large-scale DeFi thanks to its “infinite scalability" and atomic composability.
Kim's breakthrough came when he taught himself Scrypto development in early 2022, allowing him to actively build on the Radix network. Over the next year, he authored three award-winning DeFi packages - NeuRacle, GroundFinance, and Align.
In January 2023, Kim co-founded the Radix startup EmberFlow, serving as its Chief Technology Officer. EmberFlow aims to develop a suite of DeFi products leveraging the Radix network and Kim's expertise in Scrypto.
Throughout 2022, Kim also made significant contributions to the Scrypto developer community. He helped mentor new developers on Discord and GitHub, assisted with governance proposals for community projects, and created video tutorials to share what he learned as a self-taught coder. This camaraderie and voluntary support exemplifies the collaborative ethos underpinning decentralized networks like Radix.
Scrypto Contributions
Despite having no prior experience with programming, Kim rapidly gained proficiency in Scrypto development and authored multiple innovative DeFi packages that won Radix coding challenges:
NeuRacle
Kim's first entry, called NeuRacle, took second place in the Scrypto Oracles Challenge held in May 2022. NeuRacle implemented an oracle system enabling off-chain data like crypto prices to be used in on-chain Scrypto components. The design incorporated concepts from Komodo's trustless oracle model and Cerberus's DPoS consensus method to help secure the data source.
GroundFinance
Shortly after, Kim won second place in the Scrypto Lending Challenge with his GroundFinance package for decentralized finance. GroundFinance allowed users to take out loans collateralized by Radix tokens without an intermediary, showcasing Kim's innovativeness in architecting self-governing DeFi systems.
Align
In October 2022, Kim's Align package won first prize in Radix's Scrypto DAO Challenge. Align provides a framework for creating decentralized autonomous organizations, integrating features like liquid democracy, rage quitting, and novel "power taxing" mechanics invented by Kim. The extensive documentation and modular architecture make Align a leading example for DAO construction on Radix.
Vision and Beliefs
Kim has long envisioned a more equitable society where all individuals are valued for their talents and abilities rather than external factors like wealth or connections. This belief stems in part from Kim's socialist upbringing before his family emigrated from Vietnam to the United States.
When Kim discovered decentralized finance in 2020, he recognized blockchain technology's potential to realize his ideals by enabling peer-to-peer collaboration and economic empowerment without centralized intermediaries. This "Radix revelation" gave Kim hope that his lifelong vision could be made real using the unique attributes of the Radix network, including infinite scalability and atomic composability.
Kim is a passionate advocate for decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) as vehicles to bring about positive societal change. He believes well-structured DAOs could even come to supplant functions traditionally held by governments and corporations. Kim aims to continue refining tools like his Align DAO framework to allow communities to self-organize and self-govern with greater efficiency and fairness than current institutions.
At its root, Kim's vision aligns with the decentralized ethos underpinning blockchain - using technology to distribute power, foster collaboration, and align incentives. Kim contributes to making this vision real both through technical implementations like his acclaimed Scrypto packages as well as community education and advocacy.