# Tyler Spalding

> Tyler Spalding is the President of Acronym Foundation, Co-founder of Flexa, and an experienced engineer and entrepreneur with degrees from UIUC, Harvard, and MI...

- Canonical URL: https://iq.wiki/wiki/tyler-spalding
- Categories: People in crypto
- Tags: Founder
- Created: 2024-09-09T12:44:55.037Z
- Last updated: 2024-09-09T14:34:54.800Z
- Source: IQ.wiki — the world's largest blockchain and crypto encyclopedia (https://iq.wiki)

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**Tyler Spalding** is the President of Acronym Foundation and the Co-founder of Flexa, the developer organization behind [Ampera](https://iq.wiki/wiki/ampera), a grassroots payments initiative, anchored by the AMP collateral token. [\[1\]](#cite-id-py3ik1u8sz)[\[2\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  
  
  
# Education  
  
Spalding attended the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign for a Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering and then he got a Master's degree in Aerospace, Aeronautical, and Astronautical Engineering from the same university in 2002. [\[2\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  
  
He earned an MBA, Cross Registration from Harvard Business School in 2010, and afterward, he  
attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for a Master's Degree in Business Administration (MBA), Entrepreneurship and Innovation. [\[2\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  
  
# Career  
  
Tyler Spalding started his career as a Software Engineer at Microsoft followed by being a Researcher at NASA in 2004. He served as a Design Lead of the United Space Alliance and also, the United States Air Force in 2008. [\[2\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  
  
In 2009, Spalding served as the Senior Engineer, NASA Constellation Program / Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle, and then as a Researcher at MIT until 2011. [\[2\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  
  
He co-founded Tastebud Technologies in May 2011 and served as the CEO leading the company to be acquired by Raise in 2015. [\[3\]](#cite-id-izl0tr1mkeh)  
  
> “We’ve all recognized how aligned our business objectives were,” Spalding commented on the acquisition.  
> “Raise not only has a massive company that’s well-capitalized with a great team of investors, but for us, knowing the team and the culture we’d be working with really sealed the deal.”[\[3\]](#cite-id-izl0tr1mkeh)  
  
Spalding served as the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Raise.com post-acquisition until 2018. [\[2\]](#cite-id-9pl9jsyfodf)  
  
## Flexa  
  
In February 2018, he co-founded Flexa[\[5\]](#cite-id-wv46k4sry9l) alongside [Zachary Kilgore](https://iq.wiki/wiki/zachary-kilgore), a platform that offers omnichannel digital asset payments. It is also the company behind [Ampera](https://iq.wiki/wiki/ampera), a grassroots payments initiative that uses Amp as a digital collateral token.  
  
Flexa is the first use case of Amp's features as a collateral token. The Flexa Capacity contract is a collateral manager that uses Amp to collateralize the payments of merchant locations across the US and Canada. Users stake Amp in exchange for rewards funded by the merchant fees. [\[5\]](#cite-id-wv46k4sry9l)  
  
  
In January 2023, Spalding was appointed the President of Acronym Foundation, focusing on building open-source [Web3](https://iq.wiki/wiki/web3) projects including Anvil and [Ampera](https://iq.wiki/wiki/ampera). [\[4\]](#cite-id-logskok59u)  
  
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