Dirk is a serial entrepreneur and an early adopter of blockchain and related technologies based in Silicon Valley. In addition to being the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Uplandme, Inc., Dirk co-founded and is chairman of the Open Metaverse Alliance for Web3 (OMA3). He is the author of the bestselling book, Navigating the Metaverse: A Guide to Limitless Possibilities in a Web 3.0 World (Wiley, 2022). He co-founded European and US-based companies in the FinTech and digital media spaces, including the Financial Times Deutschland and Forbatec, which has been acquired by SunGard (today NYSE:FIS). Dirk mentored over 30 startups through his work at international startup accelerators in Silicon Valley and is a frequent speaker/panelist focusing on topics about the metaverse, blockchain, and platform economics. He studied Business Administration in Frankfurt and Paris and received a Ph.D. from the European Business School in Germany, where he wrote his doctoral thesis about private and state-controlled currencies.