>> Announcer: From the heart of Silicon Valley, it's theCUBE. Covering CloudNOW's seventh annual Top Women Entrepreneurs in Cloud Innovation Awards. (upbeat music) >> Hi, Lisa Martin with theCUBE, on the ground at Facebook Headquarters. We're here for the seventh annual CloudNOW Top Women Entrepreneurs in Cloud Innovation Awards. Welcoming one of the award winners and a CUBE alumni to the program, we have Tongtong Gong. You are co-founder and COO of Amberdata, Tongtong. Welcome back to theCUBE, and congrats on the award. >> Thank you, thanks for having me Lisa. >> Our pleasure. So, you've been on theCUBE before. We'll talk about Amberdata in a second. And I love the name, so I want you to tell us a little bit about that. Health and intelligence for blockchain, but one of the really interesting things about you is you are a technical female co-founder of a venture-funded company. A lot of words there, huge accomplishment. >> Tongtong: Thank you. >> Tell us about the inspiration. What was the opportunity? Was it your idea? Was it your co-founder's idea? How did this opportunity for the technology come to fruition? Then how did you, as a female, go and lead and get funding for this technology? >> Wow, how much time do I have? I can talk all day on this subject. So, it all started last 2017, summer. I was just very intrigued with blockchain technology and the potential of how blockchain can change our life and take our identity, assets, have full control, remove intermediaries. I had a full-time job at that time, leading engineering for a startup company, and I just don't have enough time in the day to learn about this new technology and what's the better way to do it, and then jump right in, start own company, and start from blockchain data. So, my background is in data analytics and computing, and when I start learning blockchain, I realized blockchain data, it's stored, it's immutable, but it's really hard to access. It's really hard to analyze. It's really hard to process without all the tools that we all know and comfortable with. So, me and my co-founder at that point were going back and forth with this new technology and the opportunities. I think it's his idea. Let's do something with the data that's stored on blockchain. Amberdata, the company's name, it's because Nick Szabo did a podcast with Tim Ferriss and Naval about blockchain is a fly trapped in amber. Upon layers and layers of amber solidified and the bubbles and the fly, you can still see it but it's immutable. You can't change it anymore. So, we're like, what brilliant name is that, right? >> Lisa: Absolutely. >> Amberdata. Without a tool, a platform like us, you can't possibly count all the bubbles in the amber. We help you extract the bubbles from the amber, the flies from the amber, and analyzing it. And that's what we do. >> Wow, that's a great analogy, a great name. Health and intelligence for blockchain. Blockchain is a very hot technology topic. Every company out there, whether they're a startup born in the cloud or legacy enterprise, wants to be doing something in blockchain. As a female co-founder, was that an advantage for you when you went in to venture capitalists looking to get funding? What do you think some of those advantages were? >> Honestly, I always consider being female is an attribute of me. It's not the definition of me. My gender doesn't define me. It doesn't constrain me. It's just who I am and I'm also engineer. I'm also incredibly curious all the time. I'm also bubbly. I'm also a wife. I'm also a daughter. So, there's just many attributes of me. When we start a company, we went into lots of friends and VCs and Meetups and we'd talk to anyone about our idea. Looking for advice, looking for validation. That's really what led us to get the funding. >> I love that. One day I hope we'll be to a place where gender doesn't define us but we know the numbers in females in technical roles. But it sounds like one of the things that you leveraged, maybe, were some of those softer skills. You're very personable. You had a great idea. You clearly have passion for it. Building your own groundswell with Meetups and a network seems like one of the key initiators of your success. >> Now you put it that way, I think so. I never thought about it that way. Yeah, 'cause in the beginning, you really try to define and refine the idea and the product. Are you solving a problem? What is the problem that you are solving? You really can't get answers unless you talk to lots of people and I think, perhaps, being a female, it really helps me just to talk to people all day long. >> It's good that you can do that. Genetically, I think we both have that in common. Tonight, as we wrap up here, you're presenting in front of Sheryl Sandberg, who is probably one of the beacons that women have globally. Not just in technology, she's obviously written some incredibly inspiring books about a number of different life situations. You must be pretty excited to have the opportunity to not only be a co-founder but to be recognized by this award and have somebody as prestigious and inspirational as Sheryl in the audience. >> Absolutely. I have both her books, Lean In and Option B. I actually bough both books in Chinese version for my mom, as well. So, I have four copies. I'm a huge fan of Sheryl. I think she's very inspirational about leaning in and take a seat at the table. One of my friend, Jamie Moy, once said, "Girl, let's forget about taking a seat. Let's create a table. Let's create a seat for other people." >> "Girl, let's create a seat." I love that. Tongtong, thank you so much for stopping by. Congratulations again on the award. >> Thank you. >> And we look forward to having you back on theCUBE again, talking more about what you're doing with Amberdata. >> Thank you for having me. >> We want to thank you. You're watching theCUBE. I'm Lisa Martin from Facebook headquarters. Thanks for watching. (upbeat music)