The inaugural LEAP 2022 took place in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on February 1-3 and surpassed everyone’s expectations. There were over 100,000 visits over the course of three days, $6.4 billion of deals announced, 700+ exhibitors, 500+ speakers and participation from 129 countries.
After the huge success of LEAP 2022, HRH Prince Mohammed Bin Salman ordered H.E. Eng. Abdullah Alswaha, Minister of Communications & Information Technology in Saudi Arabia, to make LEAP an annual event and the dates have already been announced for 2023.
Future, disruptive technologies were the main focus of LEAP, precisely why there was a BSV blockchain presence at the event, both in terms of speakers and attendance. The appetite for blockchain technology and learning how it can improve the way we do things in everyday life is palpable in Riyadh and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) as a whole.
One of the companies from the BSV Blockchain ecosystem in attendance was VXPASS, a service providing verified health records, such as vaccination verification, in a way that allows the patients to keep personal data in their hands. Justin Pauly, President of VXPASS, told CoinGeek of his successful time at CES in Las Vegas in January, how he went from one desert to the other and is now here in KSA, completing meeting after meeting.
“This is the latest and greatest, the top of the heap technology conference, so of course we’re here. We’re very excited to be here and for VXPASS to have representation and be invited to these places,” Pauly shared.
“And what a tremendous turnout. This has really been a fantastic event and to really see people gravitate towards blockchain as not a future problem but a now solution,” he added.
Dr. Maximilian Sinan Korkmaz, Managing Director of Stabilwerk Bau and P2P Software, spoke on the BSV Blockchain Fintech panel, highlighting the pain points in the construction industry and how they can be solved using the BSV blockchain. Korkmaz’s mission is to provide an all-in-one construction management solution that includes payments through smart contracts and he is traveling to events such as LEAP to help fulfil his mission.
“This is my first time in Saudi Arabia. I was always wondering what kind of a country it is. It looks amazing. I can’t wait to see around a bit and eat their amazing food. And this conference, it looks really good, there are many companies from overseas as well. I look forward to experience it’s even more in the coming hours,” Korkmaz said.
Emceeing the panel Korkmaz spoke on, “Data and payments: How blockchain can power the FinTech revolution,” was Ahmed Yousif, Middle East Lead for the BSV Blockchain for Government Initiative and co-founder of Black Stone Solutions.
“We had the data integrity from nChain, a nice and huge presentation. That’s important. And we had the presentation about the infrastructure (construction), that’s another solution. As you see the Middle East is building cities. So having a blockchain infrastructure industry in the blockchain space is very important,” Yousif summarized.
“And then we had the invoice, another way of dealing with the data. The payments and the solutions of payments in the fintech area is very important,” Yousif said, referring to Muhammad Salman Anjum, Head of the BSV Hub for MENA/South Asia and Chief Mate at InvoiceMate’s presentation.
“So we had all of these amazing speakers from BSV ecosystem coming and presenting use cases that are actually very effective in this region because this is basically the three areas that we needed the most here,” Yousif added.
For nChain’s presentation, Simit Haik, Director of Commercial and Strategy, introduced their Kensei solution and how BSV can be used for data integrity. He also described the solutions nChain can provide for better payments.
“Saudi Arabia’s looking to implement a Vision 2030, and blockchain is going to be a core part of that vision,” Naik said.
“And for us, because we have such strong ideas and a vision for how we want to see blockchain being utilised, it made perfect sense for us to be here in Saudi Arabia to attend LEAP, which is their first large scale tech conference,” he added.
“It was a perfect opportunity for us to be able to discuss how we use blockchain to increase the value of data, how we use blockchain to improve the way people make and use payments,” Naik said.
Speaking on LEAP’s keynote stage, Jimmy Nguyen, Founding President of BSV blockchain’s association, highlighted how BSV blockchain technology can facilitate a better world for everyone throughout his powerful and engaging keynote speech.
Nguyen chose the theme of “time” for his presentation because in his experience, professionals and governments can easily relate to the time-stamp functionality of the BSV blockchain.
When asked about his keynote theme Nguyen told CoinGeek, “Because Saudi Arabia is a country that is exploring blockchain adoption, very interested in it and other emerging technologies like AI, robotics, they have just begun their blockchain journey.”
“I find that when we go to markets, even sophisticated markets like Saudi Arabia, it takes just educating people about what a blockchain is because there’s so much confusion from the years of just crypto trading. And so here they want blockchain,” he added.
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