The last few months of 2016 were fairly eventful for us:

We all quit our jobs to go full time on Branche.

We developed some amazing connections and contacts in both the crypto and local business communities.

We ran an ICO token sale (with mixed results).

We created tons of a fantastic marketing and informational content.

Perhaps most importantly, we got fantastic feedback, critiques and validation from all sorts of people outside our existing network and community!

So, after our much needed holiday break … what does 2017 hold?

Well, put simply, it’s time to kick into high gear!

We’ve proven our concept, our business model, and our team. We’ve completed a functional prototype, we’ve got our IP protections in place, and we have our development and test release plans!

Our efforts will be focused on two things: development and fundraising. We began to put feelers out for angel investors in December and will continue building those relationships into the new year. While we will need a fully funded dev team to finish the app and start local market testing, there are several component elements and design pieces that need to be done, and will keep us more than busy until we have more substantial funding in place.

What this means however, is that with our noses so firmly pressed to product and business building grindstones, blog posts and other social media updates will become less frequent and regular. Be assured however, that they will continue. As we’ve said before, a large part of what Branche is about, is informing, educating and expanding peoples understanding of the financial world and how they can interact with it. We stand at an interesting nexus point between blockchain, fintech, and the evolution of the gig economy … and we believe we have something of a responsibility to share our unique perspective.

The next 12 months are going to be dramatic and extremely interesting. This is when we take Branche from *project* to *product* and we couldn’t be more excited!