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Exclusive Interview With Haawks Decloud ( @aftabshaikh7225 - L1X | Hackathon 2025 Participant)
Recorded: March 30, 2025 Duration: 0:24:22Space Recording
Short Summary
HAWKS is set to revolutionize decentralized cloud storage with a focus on user privacy and security, leveraging innovative technologies like zero-knowledge proofs and AI. The team is currently 70% through their MVP development and aims to engage with the L1X community for mentorship and support as they prepare for launch.
Full Transcription
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you're at in this crypto world.
My name is Cody and have I got another exclusive hackathon participant interview for you today.
hackathon participant interview for you today. So we're excited to have the
Hawk D Cloud team with us. I think that's right, the name of the project. So, hey, guys, how are
you? If you want to go around and just kind of introduce yourself and what your role is, that
would be great. And then we can kind of jump into the conversation here. Yeah. So first of all, I'd like
to thank you, the entire L1X team for giving this great opportunity to present our ideas in front
of you and to work with brilliant minds. And so this is one of the great opportunities for us
and everyone for young entrepreneurs and developers present here. So I'm greatly excited to go upon this interview
and the hackathon. So I'm Afatab Sheikh, founder and CEO of Hawks. So we are building a decentralized
introducing for myself. I'm looking over the development and the business management for the
Hawks dCloud. I'm having two plus years of
experience in the startup world and also work with these startups for and having a deep exposure
toward this ecosystem of the startups and also I look toward the research and development part
of the Hox. So in the last year we have also published from my side a research paper implementation
of blockchain in a healthcare sector in an international publication in springer so this is what my
intro is and so may can continue for her hello i'm mike shek co-founder of fox um
founder of Hawks. I'm leading the startup, startups, technical development, technical,
what's it in? I can hear you. Are you there?
Hello. I can hear you.
I'm Mike Shek, co-founder of HOX, leading the startup technical development with expertise
in application development and Web3.
I'm focusing on building innovation and decentralized solutions.
Yeah, Millie can continue with the intro now hey so i am milly i am a privacy professional
here my role is to ensure that whatever product we are building is privacy compliant and is
having security features every features that that is there to be a privacy compliant product.
So that, you know, we ensure privacy of the people, we ensure data privacy.
So that's my role here in Hox.
Hello, my name is Wai Patan and I am Head of Marketing at Hox Cloud.
I focus on dragging brand awareness, educating users about benefits of decentralized storage and building strong audience-based for our upcoming MVP.
With the background of web brand strategy, I specialize in leveraging social media
and creating engaging content to attract both individuals and businesses to our platform.
All right, fantastic.
Well, it sounds like you guys definitely have a well-rounded team
from marketing, compliance, development. That's fantastic. I think that's what every team needs
for sure. So perfect. Well, I think we want to know what is HAWKS all about. So why don't you
Why don't you just kind of dive in and tell us what the core concept is, and we'll take it from there.
just kind of dive in and tell us what the core concept is and we'll take it from there.
Yeah.
So, Cody, just imagine that you're leading a growing business or as an individual with juggling with sensitive data that all sits on centralized cloud,
which is vulnerable to hackers, breaches, and third-party misuse.
Our each and every five is at risk, and a single cyber attack will compromise our years of hard work.
Therefore, at Hocs, we are there to change this. And we are building a decentralized cloud storage platform for the users that
have, means they have suffered with the violation, with the data security and privacy, because
of the tech agenda, which are present in the market. And we are focusing on Hox, on Hox,
you can store, manage, collaborate with the teams and sync your data across multiple
devices using the Web3 technology and the core AI agents that are being implemented into
the system.
So this is what the Hox does.
And if we look to the problem in detail, so just in the first quarter of 2024, the total number of
between was near about 1 billion who suffered from the hacks and the misuse of data. And the
average cost per breach is close to five million dollars. And the top most affected industries are
the healthcare, manufacturing, tech, education sector. So these are some of the top industries.
So if we look toward the problem in detail, so the Web3 storage services which are present
in the market.
So they suffer with the latency, data loss, vendor lock-in.
So if we want to provide our space to the storage industry or to a storage space on
the Filecoin.
So the hardware that is capital intensive.
So it's not easy for any user to
provide the space for the storage purpose of the blockchain and the incentives that
the users get by providing their storage for the blockchain. So it's not that efficient.
And even the file sharding and the patching of the files are not being done in a proper
manner. So if some nodes goes offline, you need to make copies and you need
to pay extra for that. So this is one of the problems with Web3 services like Storage,
Rave, which are there in the Web3 sector. And if we are talking about the centralized
providers like Google Drive, Dropbox, iCloud, bCloud, so some of these are competitors
present in the centralized industry.
So what do they actually do? So they train the LLM models or the AI agents depending upon our data.
And being the core owner of our own data, we don't have our full rights or full control over their
data. And there are a number of cases, fights against tech giants because they have violated
with the privacy and the security of the users.
So if we go surf over the internet, we can find the number of cases and documents regarding
these.
So this is what we are working on.
And if we are talking about the hocks, what actually makes this hocks different?
So we'll be building the simplest and user interface
of the blockchain of the application will be as easy as web two interfaces are. So what
it will make it will create the users that are stepping into the web three industry.
So it won't be difficult to manage their private keys or the security patches which are hindering
the mass adoption of the web technology. So if we look toward the core pillars of the HOX, so we are having our
NITU token so that if a storage provider is providing the space for the blockchain, so he can
the NITU token he can be rewarded or if we are purchasing our plans, the subscription models,
so the token can be used for that application. And the second problem that we are solving is the costly hardware, the capital
intensive hardware. So we are planning to design a system application in such a manner
that nodes with any capabilities or the hardware configuration of a specific set can contribute to
the blockchain and make it a decentralized manner as the Bitcoin
or some of the true decentralized systems are present in the market.
And this will be initiated with this smart AI that will be integrated into the system.
So what this AI will do, it will choose a proper node or the host for storing the data of the users depending upon its past
performance and he can calibrate on that and use for the storing purpose and he can kill up the
latency and the other problems that are present and even the ai assistance will be provided in
the application so if you are sharing your file having some updates from the team or collaboration
or if you want to check what actually if you are sharing the file, having some updates from the team or collaboration, or if you want to check what actually, if you are sharing the file, has the team member
open or not.
So this can be done with the AI assistance and you don't need to actually sit on using
a keyboard or mouse just by speaking or interacting with the AI.
They can do each and every task for you as you do want the decentralized storages or
cloud platforms that
are present in the market. So this is what the Hox is doing. It's a platform for storing your data
across in the Web3 sector with the Web2 style of simplicity.
Nice. I like it. I like it. You covered quite a bit there. So yeah. So the thing I kind of like is how you guys are utilizing Web2 interfaces to kind of interact with the blockchain technology.
I think that that's paramount with any kind of crypto Web3 kind of experience, right, is simplicity.
You are also adding in AI.
So is this going to be kind of more like a similar
to like an IPFS kind of storage,
or do you mind diving in a little bit more
about how that kind of compares?
So we'll be using IPFS technology into this application.
And from the ground,
with the limitations which are there into the IPFS,
like the hardware intensive.
So we'll be configuring our own requirements
and our onboarding strategies with this application.
So it will be in collaboration with the IPFS
for the storage purpose for the patching of the files.
So it's a combination of that.
Okay, okay, perfect.
And so, you know, why choose to build on the Layer 1X blockchain and inside the L1X ecosystem instead of another blockchain?
So, the groundbreaking technology of L1X, like the interpolability feature and the Omnichain token system that the L1X is offering.
So, it's incredible and I'm really fascinated to the Omnichain token system that the L1X is offering. So it's incredible and I'm really fascinated
to the Omnichain token system. So if we are building on L1X, so it can help us to gain
some visibility and usability will be increased because it will be interacting with multiple
blockchains and so it can help us to uh gain more traction uh means it should
not be restricted to some particular blockchain so the omni chain token can overcome these limitations
and also the uh additionally the l1x that the extra history the core feature of l1x
so i went through that and the extra registry uh feature that is incredible in managing the transaction, verifying
the transaction across multiple blockchains. So the similar concept can be used on our application
also. So with that concept, like for verifying the data that is stored across servers on the
blockchain of Hox nodes, so that concept can be used or the same similar concept can be used to
verify that if the data is been stored or not on the nodes in a proper and secure manner. So this
is what I think the L1X is one of the best as per our needs and it's fitting in a proper manner that
we can come up with the proper solution for AIs and the interoperability features.
So that's what we have decided. Therefore, we have decided to build on L1X.
Perfect. No, no, that's a that's a good answer. So where where are you guys currently with with everything?
Is this kind of like a concept idea right now or have you guys already started building like kind of fill us in
where you're at in the stage uh so basically we started our work back in november 2024 and up till
now we have completed 70 of the development of the mvp and the four features of the uh applications
are being done and some of our are to be finalized till the product
comes into life. So this is what the actual stage of our product is.
Gotcha. Okay, that makes sense. And, you know, when it comes to the L1X hackathon,
like what specifically are you trying to achieve during this this hackathon like is it kind of awareness is it kind of access to new new technology to with the the blockchain tech or is it something else like what are your goals with with participating in the hackathon? So the main intention of participating in L1X hackathon is in since I'm following the
L1X from 2023 and one of the event that I met the founder Kevin put in an event and also the
team members like Ankita Das and the Neeraja man in an event at Pune. So while interacting with them, so I feel that
the knowledge that they are having is in is, uh, means mind blowing and it, uh, connected
with me. So that was since from that time I'm following and taking the updates of the L1X.
So the main intention is that, uh, means as it's a web intensive project, so we need some
proper type of mentoring, uh mentoring specific to web 3 world.
So the smart contracts and the tokenomics are one of the main pillars of an applications.
So if they are not right, we can have some problems in the future.
So if you're having proper mentorship and guidance from the tech experts and the L1X team,
so this can be game changing in our application development
and also the marketing that expertise that you are having. So it can be used to launch
our market strategy and build our frameworks to overcome these challenges. And lastly,
the connections and the networking opportunity that we can get from the L1X community will help us in a proper
manner. So this is what we intended to participate into the hackathon. Love it, love it. So did I
hear you correctly? You said that you were at the hackathon in India in 2023 in Pune? It was an event in Pune,
in Pune Maharashtra in 2023.
So at that time I was present there.
You were?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
That's awesome.
So I was there too.
It was a great hackathon, I thought.
It was a great event.
So it's good to see that you've been with us
for a long, long time.
So it just, I agree.
It definitely makes sense for you guys to kind of build with us.
So I do have one question.
Anybody can answer this, but I think I want to pick on Millie here.
Security, compliance, privacy is a big, big thing with a lot of people moving over from Web 2 to Web 3, right?
What are you guys basically doing to protect people's documentations or anything that they store online?
How are you guys combating that?
What approach are you taking?
Okay.
So to answer your question, firstly, we are on blockchain, right? Whatever product we have built on blockchain. And whatever thing, like as per our product, whatever the customer will be uploading, that will be stored in blockchain right so the data will be saved
that's where we are implementing the security features right and other than that to protect
whatever data we are collecting from them we are making sure that whatever documents we are
preparing we are making it compliant to whichever country we want to expand to so as of now we have uh we have done this compliance
with regards to gdpr right because that is something uh that's a parent privacy uh uh
you know legislation other than that we as we are based in india we will do it uh you know we will
do the compliances with regards to dpdpa then we will do it with regards to, you know, if we apply,
like we also plan to expand in Dubai and in UK.
So we will do it for UK GDPR as well.
And then PDPL as well.
We will make sure that whatever data we will be collecting,
it is safe and secured.
And people have that autonomy with them that, you know, their data is secure and they have that autonomy with them that you know their data is secure
and they have that privacy in their hands because it's their right they have to keep it safe so we
are trying to help the people to do that that's great that's great and as you know that's a huge
concern with a lot of people right so uh thank thank you for sharing that. Are you guys tapping into
other kind of technology around like ZKP or any of these other kind of protocols to add in another
layer of security as well? Yeah, of course. We are going to implement the zero knowledge proofs
for verifying the data and concerning the privacy of the user. So zero
knowledge proof can be game changing in this domain. So to protect its privacy without knowing
the actual data. So zero knowledge proof is really helpful for this tech. We'll be implementing that.
Perfect. Perfect. I'm a huge fan of that. I love it.
I think it's kind of cool with a lot of the different functionalities that you can do,
especially when you put it in with like DID kind of stuff, profiling, wallets, all that
kind of jazz.
So it's exciting to hear that you guys are looking into that as well.
So what do you guys basically, you said you've been around since 2024, kind of getting to that MVP stage.
You're about 70% through.
What's your go-to-market strategy?
Like, do you feel like the hackathon is going to push you over that line that you'll get to the point where you can kind of get ready to deploy it out for people to use?
Or where do you guys think around that?
So talking about the GTM go-to-market strategy,
so our ideal customer segment will be the individuals
between age 18 to 65 who are concerned about the privacy
and the security regarding their data.
So the entrepreneurs, student, lawyers, businessman,
and film industry or the music industry so these are these multimedia businesses
or the educational healthcare where the data is security is critical and it needs to be preserved
so these are our ideal customer segment where we'll be targeting so for go to my strategy will
be we are having subscription-based business model so as per you can have the plans of storage, we are starting from 100 GB and going up to
the five terabytes of subscription plans.
It can be monthly as well as yearly.
So for implementing this will be the will be coming up with some premium model for the
initial users and providing some good enough space to acquire the first user base and to test it in
the audience so this is what the freemium model will help us to scale up it in a uh in a good
manner so this will be implemented with the freemium uh freemium and the affiliate marketing
also the referral marketing which will help the web3 community to refer the friends and get some incentivized
tokens or the storage space for uh referring the customers and uh and educating the audience uh so
the main uh intention will be the uh educating and providing the awareness between the audience to
overcome to actually tell them what the problem is with their data and how
the data has been misused by tech giants, which are present like the Google Drive, Dropbox.
So these are some of, we need to make them aware.
And once they are understandable, so what actually the problem or what they are missing
out.
So at that time, this go to market strategy can help us to scale it in a proper manner
and to acquire the proper audience.
Okay.
Yeah, that makes sense.
That makes sense.
So I got one last question for you.
And since you've been kind of an OG with us
for a long, long time,
you kind of know the state of the current ecosystem, right?
So where do you see Hawks kind of know the state of the current ecosystem, right? So where do you see HAWKS kind of stepping in and where can it fit into the existing L1X ecosystem and even grow broader than
that? So L1X is housed for multiple projects and the projects that are upcoming on the ecosystem of the 11x so we see our
hox d cloud as the forefront of uh for the 11x with this similar mission of adoption to the
web mass adoption of the web 3 masses into the sector and the tools that are provided like the
omni chain and the x top registry so these are some of the widgets that matches with L1X and the Hox2.
So it can be the forefront of the L1X ecosystem.
And we see as the dominating or the mass adoptions for the L1X
and to bring on the audience for attractions.
And it can help us, both of the parties to collaborate and work
together. Love it, love it. I could totally see a widget sitting on the L1X app where people could
definitely interact with your interface through that. So that might be something to kind of
consider down the road. But yeah, that could be definitely something but uh anyways thank you guys so much
for joining me uh do you guys have any questions for me real quick while i've got you here if not
we'll call this good but uh any questions
as per now there are no questions for uh from my side but it will be amazing to work with the team. And I'm really excited to
see the upcoming results and move on further. This is what I'm thinking as per now.
Yep. Likewise. Likewise. I love getting down and talking with members of the community,
builders that are building within the community, because it's so exciting to see their vision,
that are building within the community
because it's so exciting to see their vision,
their creativity of where they're taking
what Kevin's built
and with the Layer 1X blockchain innovation
with Xtalk, DID, the security,
all that kind of jazz.
It's so fun to see it.
So thank you again for taking the time
out of your guys' schedule.
I assume it's very late there,
so we'll kind of keep it short.
But thanks to our listeners that are tuning in.
We appreciate you guys as well.
We love our L1X community.
Thank you for the love and support.
And let's definitely give Hawk some love.
And yeah, thanks again, guys.
We appreciate you.
And we'll catch you on the next one. See ya. Bye-bye.
