Dr. Navin Ramachandran has been a member of the IOTA Foundation since the end of 2016. As a practicing medical doctor and healthcare researcher, Navin took the lead of IOTA’s eHealth-focused activities, publishing on the use of the IOTA MAM protocol in healthcare, and speaking widely on the topic of IOTA and distributed ledgers. He also has a keen interest in information modeling, augmented reality and the impact of AI.

As some of you may know, Navin oversaw the development of the Trinity Wallet due to an interest in UI/UX and more human-centric uses of IOTA. What may be less well-known is that he spent time with the core engineering, research, biz dev and communications teams over the last 2 years, which helped him to gain a solid understanding of the inner workings of the IOTA Foundation. Navin is also an advisor to the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Blockchain.

On joining The Board of Directors

It is truly an honor to be invited to join the board of the IOTA Foundation. Since first learning about IOTA and joining the Foundation, I could see the great potential of this technology. In my time at IOTA, I have been impressed by the dedication and skill of the (growing) team, as well as the great collaborations that are in progress. This makes me confident of a bright future. However, there is always room for improvement.

The crypto space is fraught with drama, controversy and intense tribalism which exacerbates every disagreement. The IOTA Foundation will continue to play a leading role in pushing for change in this industry. To this end, we will focus on improving:

Governance of the board by widening representation.

Governance of the code, by working with established open source foundations.

Governance of the protocols, by working with established standards bodies.

Academic oversight, together with our research council.

Developer engagement, with better documentation, training and accreditation.

Cross-industry collaboration, by actively engaging with other DLT teams.

This is not a minor undertaking, and we expect the road ahead to be challenging. Nonetheless, this is the right path, for ourselves and the industry as a whole.

We are delighted to invite Navin to join the IOTA Foundation Board of Directors. This appointment continues the journey towards a more open and representative organization. We hope that you will continue to see the effects of these changes over the coming months. Join us in welcoming Navin Ramachandran to the IOTA Foundation Board of Directors.