Jaynti “JD” Kanani | Co-Founder of Polygon — From Underdog to Champion

Polygon is one of crypto’s most iconic underdog stories — and a big part of that mindset comes straight from Jaynti Kanani (JD). For him, the promise of Web3 is radically simple: if you’ve got a laptop and an internet connection, you can build something real — without permission, pedigree, or gatekeepers.JD puts it bluntly: you don’t need to be public-facing, you don’t need Stanford University, and you don’t even need a traditional academic path. What matters is access, curiosity, and the will to ship — and he points to builders from small villages across India proving that every day.In this episode of BeaconLayer Podcast, JD talks about his route into Web3, the hard lessons behind scaling Polygon from an early outsider into a global platform, and what he wants to see next: a Web3 that feels less like a club and more like infrastructure — where everyday developers can create, users can benefit without friction, and the technology quietly does its job in the background.