What are the parallels between the early internet boom and today's blockchain revolution? How will the tokenization of every asset—from money and commodities to real estate and private equity—fundamentally reshape global capital markets?

In this episode, host Lauren Weymouth sits down with Mathew Le Merle, a titan of tech investment and the Co-Founder and CEO of Fifth Era and Blockchain Coinvestors. With a portfolio of over 1,500 startups, including more than 80 unicorns like Ripple, Kraken, and OpenSea, Mathew offers a masterclass on the past, present, and future of digital assets.

Drawing on 30 years of experience in Silicon Valley, Mathew explains why blockchain is not a separate phenomenon but the crucial next phase in the "digitalization of everything." He breaks down complex topics into clear, actionable insights, discussing:

• The Inevitable Shift: Why the digitalization of finance is the next logical step after the digitalization of communications and content.
• The Power of Tokenization: How creating a digital proof of ownership for real-world assets will unlock unprecedented liquidity and efficiency.
• The Future of VC: How venture capital models are evolving to adapt to a tokenized landscape.
• The Innovator's Dilemma: Why traditional financial institutions struggle to adapt and how they can strategically engage with disruptive technology.
• Navigating the Noise: Mathew’s advice for investors, entrepreneurs, and students on identifying long-term value and avoiding the pitfalls of hype and speculation.

Tune in for an essential conversation for anyone looking to understand the foundational economic and technological shifts being driven by blockchain and Web3.

The U.S. just passed a monumental piece of legislation for stablecoins: The Genius Act. To break it down, host Lauren Weymouth sits with legal expert, Professor Michele Neitz of the University of San Francisco's Center for Law, Tech, and Social Good.

Is this the first domino to fall in regulating the entire digital asset space, from DeFi to NFTs? 

Together, they dissect what this new law means for consumer trust, financial inclusion, and the future of crypto innovation. They explore how the U.S. now stacks up against international regulations and Professor Neitz shares inspiring stories of how blockchain is being used for social good and why educating our legal system on new technology is more crucial than ever. 

Tune in to understand the new rules of the road for stablecoins!

Recorded live from the Apex conference in Singapore, this special episode of All About Blockchain features a deep dive into the fusion of artificial intelligence and blockchain technology. Host Lauren Weymouth, head of Ripple's University Blockchain Research Initiative (UBRI), sits down with Professor Yang Lui of Nanyang Technological University to discuss a groundbreaking collaboration: building a programmable multi-agent AI ecosystem directly on the XRP Ledger.

Listen in as Dr. Lui shares his journey from traditional cybersecurity to the cutting edge of "agentic AI," where intelligent agents can audit smart contracts, identify zero-day vulnerabilities, and even simulate the thinking of a hacker. They explore the critical difference between AI security and AI safety, sharing fascinating and slightly scary stories of AI agents that learn to "cheat" or act on their own accord. Discover how this new AI layer moves from a white paper to live middleware in under a year, what it means for the XRPL community, and what the future holds as we work to digitize human capabilities like memory, abstraction, and even creativity into the machines that will power the next generation of Web3.

Viewable conference session on YouTube

Explore how new technologies like autonomous systems and blockchain will have an impact on our world and how research scientists are building a more open, fair and transparent ecosystem for future users.

This conversation with Prof. Eduardo Castello covers how robotics combined with blockchain technology, creates new distributed robotic systems that help, support, and change the way humanity interacts with robots. 

Prof. Castello leads the Cyber-Physical (CyPhy) Life research group at the School of Science and Technology, IE University More info on projects can be found here.

Blockchain helps bring about integrity of data and when data is trusted it can solve many problems. Hear about one solution, the Volta Initiative - a real life use-case that is creating a market place in Africa to help farmers.

We are joined by Finance expert, Raša Karapandža, Dean of EBS Business School  in Germany and Visiting Professor/Researcher at NYU Abu Dhabi. This professor is widely regarded as a thought leader in blockchain and crypto, having advised members of the US Congress on regulating Crypto and other blockchain related technologies and having served on Board of Director's for global payment processors like RS2.

By empowering farmers with blockchain based financial access, we can cultivate positive change.

As crypto security remains a major concern, secure key management infrastructure is increasingly important.

A conversation with Riad Wahby the CEO of Cubist. Riad is a leading academic researcher and applied cryptographer responsible for the design and specification of several cryptographic protocols that form the basis for many Blockchains such as Ethereum and Avalanche. Additionally he is an electrical and computer engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University. 

Imagine we could more seamlessly verify and authenticate our existence to access services across various platforms. Digital Identity enables trusted communication in the increasingly digital world while preventing fraud and theft.

A conversation with the President of GCIT, Royal University of Bhutan. Audrey Low will educate listeners on the use case of Bhutan's NDI and share how she helped roll digital identity out at a national level in Bhutan. 

Worried about voter rigging? There is so much distrust in electoral systems around the world.  Nations seek a fairer, more efficient, transparent way to hold elections.

Public blockchains make voting and counting information accessible at any time and because every voter's vote is stored on a publicly readable blockchain,
each voter can verify that their vote is stored securely.

A conversation with Zkrypto Head of Business Development, Aerin Kim about a project under Professor Hyunok Oh that spun off from Hanyang University. 

Check out this timely conversation about revolutionary zkVoting that ensures votes cannot be altered or tampered with.

Central banks are reaching beyond legacy financial systems into the digital world to embrace new technologies and systems.   Most central banks have initiated projects on adoption of blockchain in CBDC. 

We dive into this prominent use-case with Computer Engineering Professor, Andreas Veneris of University of Toronto.  He has been in the digital asset space for over 14 years and commissioned by several central banks in different nations to advise on technical, legal and economic angles of a nation’s proposed digital currency. 

Tech-savvy listeners who are excited about cars, IoT, data, crypto, Web3, and software development can benefit from listening to this conversation between Alex Rawitz, Co-Founder and COO at DIMO and President of Cornell Blockchain, Leah Valente.

How does owning  more data collected by your car provide more value to you? And can you leverage this data to build a better connected car experience? Learn how an open platform can connect data producers (like cars) and consumers (applications and businesses) to unlock the next generation of mobility services.