VANCOUVER, British Columbia, April 12, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Hunter Technology Corp. (TSX-V: HOC; OTCQB: HOILF; WKN: A2QEYH, FSE: RWPM, ISIN: CA4457371090) (“Hunter” or the “Company”), a leading innovator in digital hydrocarbon marketplace transactions for physical oil, is pleased to share select excerpts relating to digitalizing the oil value chain and Hunter’s blockchain technology taken from recent interviews featuring Hunter’s CEO Dr. Florian M Spiegl. The excerpt is based upon a podcast conducted by the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber and other interviews during March and April 2021. A full copy of the Q&A is available on Hunter’s website at www.huntertechnology.com.
Your solution OilEx is built for small independent producers. Why?
Small independent producers are a significant part of the global oil industry. In the USA alone, the small and private independent producers collectively across more than 2,000 companies produce 22% of all oil and generate around $60,000,000,000 (60 Billion) US Dollars in annual revenue. Each company, on average, is relatively small with less than 2,000 barrels of oil per day in production, around 12 employees and often without a dedicated person marketing the product. So uniquely the USA –the largest oil producer and exporter in the world – sees a significant portion of total production coming from small producers.
Hunter is focused to bring its digital innovation to this target group, which tends to have the most significant gap to digitalize the selling of their product compared to the larger companies who started this process earlier. With a fully digital proposition, it becomes possible to aggregate and profitably serve this sector in the industry at scale, providing a corresponding economic opportunity for us.
Hunter acquired the financial and blockchain technology company FinFabrik that you co-founded. How does that support Hunter's mission?
FinFabrik specialized early in developing digital trading platforms for multiple asset classes, using blockchain technology. As a FinTech company, we brought both the people and their expertise as well as deployable solutions to Hunter Technology.
For example, the FinFabrik platform CrossPool enables digital investment in alternative assets. It uses a proprietary permissioned blockchain infrastructure to digitalize the investment process and assets as well as to manage the identity of investors. The experience and expertise we gathered by building this system and the technology itself today help us develop Hunter's solutions such as OilEx and bring it to market faster.
Is there real value in using blockchain technology for what you are trying to achieve?
Blockchain, like any technology, is neutral. It can be used for good and bad and applied to solve real problems or be a mere gimmick. As a rule, we apply blockchain in our solutions where it is the best technology to solve a problem. The standardized, reliable, and trusted recording of production and transaction data is one such area where the qualities of blockchain technology such as immutability and decentralization of records are truly valuable. Another example is digital contracts: by using blockchain to create smart contracts that combine machine and human readability, agreements become digital with the potential for automation of processes. At the same time, leveraging cryptographic signatures ensures legal enforcement.
Beyond that and looking further into the future, there will be more and more innovation coming out of interesting areas such as Decentralized Finance. This will not happen immediately, but we will be well positioned to offer the benefits and opportunities of this space to our clients when the time is right. For that, we are natively building our solutions on blockchain.
What is the opportunity in digitalizing oil value chains?
We see vast potential in this. If we look at the world today, numerous sectors and industries already function fully digitally. Software has eaten the world, in many ways. But there remain a few areas that are just starting with this development. Transacting between producers and buyers of physical oil is one of them. If oil is sold by a producer to a buyer today, most of the process is manual, offline, and follows a complex process with many different incompatible systems involved, including fax machines and paper documents. This leads to challenges that we can tackle by lifting the entire process on a digital level, using modern technology. It will unlock tremendous value in this market.
What are your priorities this year?
The first six months are all about building and delivering a product with a great market fit, reflecting the market convictions we have and following the insights we generated from industry research. We do this in close collaboration with industry experts, our advisers, and potential future clients and by leveraging our internal expertise in technology and the energy industry.
The second half of the year will bring the most important milestone for us: the first live transaction of physical oil between independent producers and purchasers on our digital marketplace OilEx. This will serve as a proof point of our vision and our ability to deliver. After that, OilEx will be live in a Private Beta with selected partners, and we will accelerate platform development based on the valuable insights from continuous real-world transactions and the engagement with our early clients. With the end of the year, OilEx will go publicly live in our target markets of serving small producers and connecting them to purchasers, brokers, and traders in a fully digital end-to-end process.
Which long-term goals have you set?
Over the next three to five years, we will take up market share in the specific area of physical oil transactions between smaller producers and purchasers, on a global scale. We will use our technology to support clients and go after new opportunities in this highly dynamic sector. Industry change will be our friend and we will actively explore the expansion of our platforms to additional services and potentially other resource categories.
Sources:
Podcast interview conducted by the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber and published on its websites and social channels.
Video interview conducted by Star Finance GmbH and published via Stock Telegraph.
Both interviews are available as direct links on our website.
ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Florian M Spiegl
Chief Executive Officer
(888) 977-0970
For further information, visit our website at www.huntertechnology.com
NEITHER TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICES PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED IN POLICIES OF THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE.
Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Information.
This news release contains certain statements which may constitute forward-looking statements or information (collectively, "forward-looking statements") regarding Hunter’s business development plans. Forward-looking statements are statements that relate to future, not past, events. In this context, forward-looking statements often address expected future business and financial performance, including factors beyond Hunter’s control, and often contain words such as "anticipate", "believe", "plan", "estimate", "expect", and "intend", statements that an action or event "may", "might", "could", "should", "will" or be "on track to" be taken or occur, or other similar expressions. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, included herein are forward-looking statements. By their nature, forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements, or other future events, to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward looking statements (including execution risk, market risk, industry risk, market reaction, the impact of general economic conditions and competition from other industry participants, as well as stock market volatility). In this news release, forward-looking statements relate to, among other things, Hunter’s business development plans as well as Hunter’s future performance as it develops its business. Although Hunter believes that the expectations in its forward-looking statements are reasonable, they are based on factors, estimates and assumptions concerning future events which may prove to be inaccurate. Those factors and assumptions are based upon currently available information. Such forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that could influence actual results or events and cause actual results or events to differ materially from those stated, anticipated or implied in the forward-looking statement. Such factors include, but are not limited to: risks relating to delays, development and marketing risks, unforeseen requirements resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, commodity prices, inability to access, on favorable terms, sufficient capital from internal and external sources, the ability to access, hire and retain employees; regulatory changes and impacts, timing and completion of the Company's online platforms as well as general business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties. As such, readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements, as no assurance can be provided as to future results, levels of activity or achievements. The forward-looking statements contained in this news release are made as of the date of this news release and, except as required by applicable law, Hunter does not undertake any obligation to publicly update or to revise any of the included forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. The forward-looking statements contained in this document are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement. Trading in the securities of Hunter should be considered highly speculative. There can be no assurance that Hunter will be able to achieve all or any of its proposed objectives. Please review Hunter’s SEDAR filings including its management discussion and analysis available under the Company's profile at www.sedar.com for a more fulsome discussion of risk factors affecting Hunter.