Our Leadership Team

ED GILLEN

CEO and Founder

Ed Gillen is the CEO and founder of Altfund. Ed has traded equities over the last 20 years and options for the last seven. He got involved with Crypto during the 2017 boom and also started active venture investing around the same time.

He has two decades of experience running startups in various roles. As Vivify Health’s Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer, he was critical in the rapid growth from Vivify’s inception in 2012 to acquisition by UnitedHealth Group/Optum in 2020. Earlier in his career he held various director and management roles for American Heart Association and held strategic positions in two acquired technology startups, MEDHOST and ProHost (which ultimately became OpenTable).

Bobby McFarland

Founding Investor/Advisor

Bobby is a founding investor and advisor to Altfund. With over 20 years in technology and advertising he is currently a Director at Twitter focused on their advertising initiatives. In 2020, Twitter acquired CrossInstall, an industry leader in mobile advertising within the multi-billion dollar gaming industry.

Prior to founding CrossInstall, Bobby served as VP of Business Development for Adknowledge and held positions in several startups including Super Rewards (acquired by Adknowledge) and Trialpay (acquired by Visa). He was first introduced to Bitcoin in 2010 and has been participating in the crypto markets for the last 5 years.

Ben Smithee

General Partner & Chief Marketing Officer

Ben is a General Partner & the CMO at Altfund GP, LLC. He oversees planning development and execution of the organization’s brand strategy and marketing with a focus on brand awareness and investor growth. Ben also is the CEO of The Smithee Group (TSG), a Digital Growth Agency. His experience ranges from engagements with global brands such as McDonalds, General Mills, Coca-Cola, EA Games, Cox Automotive. Serena Williams, and Signet, to startups and scale-ups looking to utilize digital and see true performance results.