Travelocity co-founder joins HOKK Finance as CTO

HOKK Finance, one of the original meme-tokens that peaked at an $800M market cap in May 2021, has appointed Travelocity co-founder Lawrence Hutson as chief technology officer.

As CTO, Lawrence will be instrumental in developing HOKK Finance’s decentralized finance ecosystem. He’ll also support HOKK Finance’s global expansion and product development plans as it aims to compete with legacy banking. 

Before joining HOKK Finance, Lawrence worked as a computer scientist and economist across areas such as blockchain, cryptocurrencies, NFTs, DeFi, smart contracts, decentralized applications, tokenomics and the metaverse. He also co-founded and served as CTO for Travelocity, the world’s first travel website, before Expedia acquired it for $280m in 2015.

He commented: “I became interested in HOKK Finance since serving the project as an advisor. After working on numerous DeFi crypto projects as a CTO and Tokenomist, the utility of a DeFi token is near and dear to my heart along with frictionless crypto payment systems.

“For a meme token to make a transition to a DeFi player is simply genius if you consider how many DeFi platforms struggle to gain a strong community. By leveraging its brand and scaling its products to consumers globally, HOKK is uniquely positioned to grow exponentially. There are many unique features that do not currently exist together in the crypto space that come together to make HOKK what it is. This is why I am super excited to join HOKK as its CTO.”

Lawrence joins HOKK Finance at a pivotal moment for the company, with it recently launching an Ethereum aggregator and a range of yield-earning NFTs. Mark Basa, global brand and business manager at HOKK Finance, believes that appointing Lawrence as CTO is what the brand needs to successfully position itself as more than just another meme token and show the world that its cryptocurrency and range of products can have a real-world utility.

He said: ‘’We’ve now built all the infrastructure to scale the company. Our team is growing, our products are getting more features, and we’re just building and building away every single day – no matter what the market is doing.

“With Lawrence taking this c-suite position, we have an exceptionally experienced leader who has built and sold quite a famous company but also someone who has the experience we need to compete in one of the fastest-growing industries on the planet. Lawrence could help us become a market leader in a short amount of time.’’