Fresh off his globetrotting trips to Korea Blockchain Week and Token2049 in Singapore, Earnscape’s intrepid CEO, Steve Wood, is now sending us exclusive video dispatches from Bali. Yes, Steve has traded the boardroom for the beach as he joins the highly selective XFounders Bootcamp, Season 4. The ultimate test of ambition: set in paradise.
Held in the Balinese tropical paradise, this intensive 30-day residency is powered by the Starknet Foundation and is designed to push ambitious founders past their limits and up, up, up into the rarified air of Web3 success.
The camp focuses on real-time application and practice over dry theory. Their curriculum is strategically tailored for founders in the Starknet ecosystem. The agenda covers everything from “Leveraging Starknet for Bitcoin projects” to “Ecosystem grants and support programs”.
For those not already in the know, the purpose of the XFounders Bootcamp is this: It’s a specialized Go-to-Market (GTM) acceleration program for 10 select seed and Series A Web3 startups who are ready to go big. Unlike traditional accelerators, XFounders is “Set To Do Things Differently.” How differently? Steve is sending us all the alpha from inside the camp. Let’s find out!
Day 3: When Paradise Meets Pressure
On Wednesday the 8th, Steve sent his latest dispatch, and the atmosphere was electric with GTM strategies. Go-to-market execution is famously the biggest challenge for projects as audience acquisition is costly, and brand building demands serious time. XFounders is forcing founders to confront this challenge head-on.
According to Steve, much of the third day was devoted to intense problem-solving sessions where all the companies currently in the program put their vulnerabilities on display:
“One of the things that we did a lot today was workshop about the potential problems that we might have going to market,” Steve reports. “We all sat down and brainstormed with each other and workshop to try and figure out exactly what assumptions we were making about our markets and including the technical capabilities of our products to be able to identify the potential fault points and the friction points that might arise as we either scale, deploy, or even build whatever it is that we’re trying to release.”
The accelerator’s unique format involves interactive, practice-oriented sessions where Founders are meant to gain immediate value and “implement it right after the session.” XFounders is about building lasting, meaningful connections with top-tier VCs, partners, and founders, both inside and outside the seminars. Experts involved include leaders like Henri Lieutaud and Dylan Kugler from the Starknet Foundation, offering personalized programs and practical mentorship.
Earnscape’s Edge: A Year in the Market
While other startups might have been sweating the technical friction points, Steve can confirm that Earnscape entered the bootcamp with significant operational maturity. Having a live product means the intense workshop sessions feel more like a tuning mechanism than an overhaul.
“Most of the cases that we explored as Earnscape were not too particularly problematic because our product has been live for over a year and our live streaming portions have been live since the beginning of the year,” Steve notes.
The focus now shifts from identifying theoretical problems to executing the final steps before a massive scaling push.
“We do have a couple of assumptions,” Steve acknowledges, every company does. “But we’re in the process of ironing out the last of those right now before we scale once we launch this integration that we’ve currently been just kind of waiting on our partners to deploy at this point, which sounds like it’s going to happen relatively soon. But once that happens, then we should be ready to go without any more difficulties.”
Showtime: Startup Warriors
It’s not just a bootcamp; it’s a show! XFounders has transformed the accelerator into the Startup Warriors Show, described as Web3’s first “edutainment show.” The goal is to provide an organic solution to the GTM challenge by sharing founders’ real stories, boosting visibility, and driving customer acquisition. This revolutionary format is designed to secure significant audience reach for both personal branding and product awareness.
As Marijo Radman, Co-founder of Alterscope, noted when comparing XFounders to other renowned accelerators, “this one stood out.” This experience is about more than just crypto trends; “it’s about business, startups, and both personal and professional growth.”
Check out Steve’s candid take on the experience in the video below. Also, stay connected as we follow Earnscape’s journey to the final Demo Day. There, strategies will be refined and pitches will be made to VCs, experts, and everybody on YouTube who tunes in.
