Astar Network CEO Sota Watanabe to Shed Light on Why Japan is Embracing Crypto at Consensus 2023

[PRESS RELEASE – Tokyo, Japan, April 17th, 2023]

Astar Network, a smart contracts platform for multichain, is delighted to announce that its Founder and CEO Sota Watanabe will be presenting at the prestigious Consensus 2023 event in Austin, Texas. He will be taking the stage on Thursday, April 27 at 11:00 – 11:30 CT.

Sota Watanabe will be discussing why Japan is embracing crypto while regulators in other leading economies are struggling to figure out how to deal with crypto and Web3. He is a leading authority on the subject, having worked closely with the Japanese government in shaping the nation’s Web3 strategy.

As lawmakers and regulators from the US to Europe to Asia express increased wariness of crypto, Web3 promotion remains part of Japan’s national strategy. An early mover in the field, Japan learned hard lessons from the 2014 Mt Gox collapse and the record 2018 Coincheck hack and its approach to regulation has mitigated the impact of FTX’s collapse on Japanese users.

“I’m excited to join this group representing Japan’s crypto community to share insights with the Consensus community. Being a founder of the first public blockchain in Japan has led me to become involved in planning a national strategy to use digital assets and develop Web3 solutions. I want to bring those lessons to the US and other countries,” said Sota Watanabe, Founder of Astar Network.

Today, the Japanese government has made Web3 a part of its national strategy and Astar Network CEO Sota Watanabe is helping the government as well as the key business players on a path forward in Web3. Japan’s leading corporations including Toyota Motor Corporation and Sony Network Communications have teamed up with Astar Network to explore the opportunities in Web3.

Consensus 2023, the coveted Web3 event from CoinDesk, is all set to kick off from April 26 to April 28. It is the world’s largest and most influential gathering that brings together all sides of the cryptocurrency, blockchain and Web3 community, including the developers, investors, founders, brands, policymakers and more. In its 2022 edition, the event saw over 20,000 attendees from 112 countries alongside over 500 thought leaders and speakers.

Astar Network is the leading Layer-1 in Japan, having been voted the most popular blockchain in the country by the Japanese Blockchain Association. It is the go-to blockchain for developers and enterprises interested in exploring the Japanese Web3 space. Astar is also the first public blockchain from the country to be listed there despite Japan’s strict listing regulations. Astar’s native token ASTR is registered as a cryptocurrency, not a security, by the Japanese government.

About Astar Network

Astar Network supports the building of dApps with EVM and WASM smart contracts and offers developers true interoperability with cross-consensus messaging (XCM) and a cross-virtual machine (XVM). Astar’s unique Build2Earn model empowers developers to get paid through a dApp staking mechanism for their code and the dApps they build.

One of the first parachains to come to the Polkadot ecosystem, Astar is a vibrant network that is supported by all major exchanges and tier 1 VCs. Astar offers the flexibility of all Ethereum and WASM toolings for developers to start building their dApps. To accelerate growth on Polkadot and Kusama Networks, Astar SpaceLabs offers an Incubation Hub for top TVL dApps.