In this Episode
Robin Matthes, Tim Betts and Roland van Reenen talk with Rob McNealy about PAC Global, sustainable food forests and Summit Blockchain.
About Robin Matthes
He is the Chief Philanthropy Officer / Head of Charity at PAC Global which is a blockchain company that focuses on social good. Robin is also the master coordinator for the Washington Elite Summit.
Robin can be found any given day feeding the poor, sheltering the homeless and donating to refugees. He’s got a big heart and works tirelessly to make as much positive social impact as he possibly can!
Has been laying the foundation for Blockchain and social good on several fronts. In the past he’s been mainly attending to Venezuelan Refugees and is currently focused on growing edible food forests for those who need it most. Robin is according to himself: “Connecting Charity and Sustainable Development with Blockchain Technology”.
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About Roland van Reenen
Born in 1964 in the Netherlands Roland always had a curiosity for nature and cultural diversity. He is a certified teacher for primary education but did spend 17 years of his life in the music business.
In 1998 he started a career in the organic food industry as the manager of what became in 2000 the very first organic supermarket in the Netherlands. Beside this work he studied the science of ayurveda and different other natural healing techniques.
In 2013 he did discover permaculture and from that moment he was at the beginning of his genesis. In 2015 he moved to Curacao in the Caribbean with a solid mission in his mind: to research how permaculture could make a difference in a drought stricken deforested area. With zero budget he established a food forest around his house and started to give workshops. In the same time he started a weekly organic food subscription for about 80 subscribers bringing organic food direct from the farmer to the consumer.
In 2018 he was personally asked by the minister of agriculture Sra Suzy Carmelia Romer to build up a few permaculture plots for educational purposes. In 2019 he organised for the ministry of Health Environment and Nature a intensive course in syntropic agroforestry with teachers from Brazil. He is still leading a project with the aim of implementing this farming technique in Curacao. In 2019 also he has been asked by the government to become a mentor for the Regenerative Organic Agriculture Program provided by the Maharishi University in Iowa. This week he starts a function as a mentor for a course in hydroponics presented by the University of the West Indies in Trinidad.
He is totally convinced that food forestry as developed as syntropic agroforestry will solve most of our fundamental crises.
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About Tim Betts
Mr. Betts has over 20 years of business and finance experience including private equity, venture capital, mergers and acquisitions, investment banking, and operations. He is currently the Co-Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Summit Blockchain, Inc. since its inception in July 2018. Summit Blockchain, with headquarters in California, is an institutional investor focused exclusively on making investments in energy efficient blockchain networks. The firm likes to take an activist role whereby they typically have a seat on the board of directors and strive to provide additional value over and above capital infusion.
Several notable investments of Summit include PAC Global, the fourth largest masternode blockchain network in the world based on Proof-of-Stake technology (source: masternodes.online), and SmartCash. In addition, Mr. Betts is the Chief Strategy Officer at PAC Global.
Previously he was the CEO of American Restaurant Holdings, Inc., a private equity fund structured as a holding company to make acquisitions in the retail industry. He identified, structured, and negotiated multiple transactions involving the acquisitions of various regional and national restaurant brands. At its peak it employed nearly 1,000 personnel (including franchised locations) and went from $0 to approximately $40 million in systemwide sales. Upon the acquisition of Muscle Maker, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRIL), a portfolio company of American Restaurant Holdings, Mr. Betts served as its acting CEO and was Chairman of the Board until April 2018. Muscle Maker is a unique healthy fast casual restaurant brand founded in 1995 with nearly 40 store locations and a primary focus on military bases for corporate stores along with franchised locations.
Additional experience includes the President of Nobis Capital Advisors, a regional investment firm located in Newport Beach, California, and various management positions at investment banking firms including Westcap Securities, CK Cooper and Company, and the Seidler Companies. He was also a Senior Research Analyst at SKY Capital Partners, a Taiwan-based venture capital firm with approximately $300M in committed capital. Notable technology investments included Silicon Storage Technology (acquired by Microchip Technology), American Xtal Technology (NASDAQ: AXTI), and Gridcore Systems International.