Hey Fantomians! The past few weeks have been absolutely phenomenal, with a part of our team going back and forth between Sydney and Dubai, and with Bariq, Michael Chen, and Andre going to New York Blockchain Week to expand our network in the global blockchain ecosystem. This write up has been waiting for a while now, but we’re glad to finally be able to share some of the exciting things we have been doing in Dubai lately, without spoiling too many of the beans of what’s yet to come.

The official opening of the Australian Trade Mission in Dubai.

To kick it off, Fantom advisor and head of the Sydney-based Fantom Innovation Lab, Ashton Hettiarachi, along with David Freuden and Fantom’s Tech Advisor Andre Cronje, went to Dubai as part of the delegation of Austrade (Australian Trade Commission) Blockchain Mission to Dubai.

As part of the Austrade delegation, this trip provided exclusive and direct access to key officials directly responsible for the Dubai Smart City Initiatives, and the key opinion leaders in Dubai who are in charge of bringing blockchain-enabled use cases to Dubai.

Ashton Hettiarachi, Head of Fantom Innovation Labs

Only 11 companies were part of the Austrade delegation. The Fantom Foundation has been invited to exclusive 1-on-1 meetings with Smart Dubai senior executives, Dubai Future Foundation, Dubai Blockchain Centre, the Australian Ambassador to the UAE and some major partners including ConsenSys in Dubai.

The Australian Blockchain Mission in Dubai lasted from the 31st of March until the 3 rd of April, and we were extremely proud to be a part of it along with ADCA, Blockchain Global, BuildSort, Civic Ledger, CSIRO, Matrix Thread, Pink Diamond Capital, Till Payments, WORBLI, and the World Blockchain Innovation Association (WBIA). The event kicked off with a greeting from the Australian Ambassador to the UAE to all the participants of the Trade Mission, inside of the Dubai Office of the Future.

Dr Marwan Al Zarouni, also known as ‘’Satoshi of Dubai’’

On the first day, Dr Marwan Al Zarouni, the CEO of the Dubai Blockchain Centre, explained to us what the role was of their organization in the middle-eastern Blockchain Ecosystem and how they can support companies and participants of the Austrade Trade Mission with creating a footprint in Dubai to drive mutually beneficial business cooperation between both regions.

Mohammed Al Sharid, Program Director for the Innovation Accelerator at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Innovation Fund

After Dr Marwan ’s talk, we were quickly followed up by presentations from Mr. Mohammed Al Sharid, the project manager from Smart Dubai, and Mr Zayd Raoof, Program Director for the Innovation Accelerator at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Innovation Fund (MBRIF). In these presentations they explained to the Austrade delegates on how to pitch and secure business in Dubai as a blockchain-focussed organization, and what the role and responsibilities are of Smart Dubai in this process.

Group Picture (Andre Cronje, Ashton Hettiarachi, and David Freuden on the far left.)

During our first trip in Dubai with the Fantom Innovation Lab, and Andre Cronje, we met and interacted with dozens of government departments and officials, advisors, and partners. In these meetings, we had the opportunity to introduce our technology from a high level, and we were proud to introduce the key decision makers in the Dubai Blockchain Ecosystem to our Innovation Lab which will here on forth focus on facilitating follow up meetings and discussions with various entities in Dubai.

As we may have shared in earlier correspondence, we initially started with a focus on Smart City initiatives all around the world through our foundation, but we’ve retooled that focus by approaching use case studies in a more distributed manner throughout our organization. In this new model, Fantom Innovation Lab will be focused on all forms of blockchain adoption around the UAE specifically including but not limited to, Smart City Initiatives, because the opportunities in the UAE are countless unlike any other region. Aside from that we will also be forming new teams and hiring additional talent to pursue our use case studies in other regions, as we wish for adoption of our technology across a multitude of regions.