UBRI Connect a Success in Canada

An in-person event live from the Toronto Metropolitan University (TMY), Ted Rogers School of Management, the agenda was filled with a host of principal subjects featuring: Central Bank Digital Currencies, Decentralised Finance and Decentralised Exchanges, Tokenisation, Digital Identity, Real-World Utility, and Sustainability. 

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Our ESF and UK CBT team presented their findings relevant to these areas and upcoming plans for 2024 in expanding the UK research scene, as well as explored potential future collaborations within the existing international UBRI network: Chairman Paolo Tasca, Head of Scientific Community Francesco Pierangeli, and Research Fellow Walter Hernandez .

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Overall, the 2 days overall had several major considerations and narratives:  

• Keynote session by Dawn Song (UC Berkeley) and Aanachal Malhotra (Head of Research at RippleX) spoke positively about the progress of innovative on-chain finance models and the benefit of incorporating ZKPs (Zero-Knowledge Proofs), while keeping sight on the ongoing risks associated with exploitations of cross-chain bridges. 
• Scott Hendry (Bank of Canada) pointed out that the development of CBDCs depended on the cohesion of changes in national law and questioned the ability of central banks to guarantee issuance, although underlined the merit in having a new public money. 
• CBDC workshop led by Kenichi Ueda (University of Tokyo) and Marcos Simplicio (FGV São Paulo) showcased evidence of adopting faster and cheaper payment systems such as PIX that are easy to integrate for consumers. Also, they elaborated further on the mixed feedback from already initiated CBDC programs in Cambodia and Laos.

• Jillian Grennan (UC Berkeley) and Gregory Landau (Regen Network) - evaluated the real-world applications of blockchain technology over the unsuccessful traditional verification methods in sustainability, urging the need for a faster rate of adoption.
• Laura Chioda (UC Berkeley), Henry Kim (York University), Rasa Karapandza (NYU Abu Dhabi / EBS), and Miesha Williams (Spelman College) - there is a grand problem with the social reputation of cryptocurrency that hasn’t been totally overcome, particularly with security of projects, UI/UX friendliness, as well as digital literacy and mobile internet accessibility across developing countries. 
• Hyunok Oh (Hanyang University, Zkrypto) - illustrated a case-study of blockchain-based voting system that allows you to cast ballots in an anonymous way while verifying the validity of democratised polls. 

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To sign off, our team was happy to have participated in another valuable conference held by Ripple's UBRI Connect reflecting on outcomes from 2023 and strengthening ties with a host of leading universities in the upcoming year.