Elena Obukhova on BlockConf's global virtual conference in 2020

0:23you're very welcome I'm excited to learn a little bit about the block on digital conference this conference looks huge you know if you could kick it off by giving background on you know what inspired you to organize this conference and what is expected of the digital event oh yeah sure let me tell you a brief about how we started with a block on digital actually

0:45started just two months ago Vander pandemic was announced and went all countries started going crazy with lockdowns so we saw the opportunity to give people something different from what was existing on the market because many events they actually went online they were offering online streaming core of the gasps speakers and we decided that we can actually take it further and

1:09give people the full networking experience course when you travel for a conference are usually looking for some business opportunities right to get in touch with people to get some valuable business connections and we saw the opportunity to create our platform that will actually replicate with a full of flying experience and to place it online and that's what our become digital is

1:35about and apart from that we also so that for example there are many people who actually wanted third visit so many blockchain conferences but they never had a chance the queries like because the price is too high to fly and other companies you know the four days they just start and the people who will do the business and networking founders or like people of forest level positions

2:00and the other employees they never have a chance are to fly and explore more about watch-chain but since it's online we can open our virtual conference hall for everyone and welcome people one Lauren Baba blockchain that's why also capture our content so diversified and to welcome people who like her make sure we do the business and build some

2:27valuable connections over there that's great and I really like how you focused as well on the networking part because when I've gone to blockchain conferences in the past the networking part and connections are so valuable you know all of the great speaker information is always good and I'm glad that you have such a great lineup of speakers which we will get into in a

2:48little bit here as well but the networking part is hard to replace and that was one of the things that the crypto community had mentioned when they were stuck on online and on Twitter saying you know crypto conferences are the best part of it is going to see your friends networking having drinks you know and now we're having virtual drinks so I guess my next question is

3:08about in your past conferences have you organised a blockchain conference before and you know yes or no and how is the pivot been to creating creating a hundred percent virtual event this time you know and how does that change from organizing of an in-person venue as for me I didn't organize personally or blockchain conferences but my partner he did organize many booking conferences

3:36before in Latin America so he's bringing this expert sister to become digital those have a lot of valuable speakers that he introduced her to have a conference and I'm bringing cars a full network from Europe from Asia offer companies that would like participate and since Wells organize their startups our demo day I'm mostly working with organizing the startups demo day as my

4:04network includes a lot of participants and startups that of course are also experiencing a lot of problems surgeries lockdown and we decided as a chance also to kind of shake cars or VC industry and make some deals happening yeah that's great that you know startups are able to pitch on the demo day and their products and it looks like the schedule is just packed full of the

4:31startup demos as well as all of these great speakers and the lineup is 48 hours of straight you know non-stop conferencing and speakers that sounds like quite the handful for a lot of people you know is this information going to be available afterwards or should we just look at the best speakers and try to tune in when we can because it sounds like you have so much great

4:52information in such a short amount of time yo Chris Google actually provide the recording some of the presentations as it will be available for people or is business and our VIP tickets afterwards and we of course will publish are the best and the most interesting presentations online to make sure is that everyone can have access and they can also watch it afterwards but we

5:17strongly recommend to attend it online the queries will have a Q&A session and they will be able not only to watch the presentation but actually ask questions sorry – the guest speakers and I think this is one of the most valuable parts in online streaming of our presentations there's definitely a lot of value there and I could see how the barriers

5:39to entry to go to a conference and it can be a click away as opposed to you know a plane away so with that being said are you seeing a huge number of attendees you know registering and people already confirmed for this event because it's online you have expect actually a lot of attendees but it's very hard to predict right now the chorus for us of course it's a four star

6:04online event so it's very hard to see the exact numbers it will be like at the pen time but of course sorry since everyone is on lockdown and I personally saw a huge interest in online conferences so more and more people subscribing and when we look at they're just normal webinars and being hosted on a daily basis he's also still getting so many people the chorus

6:29everyone bonds networking so and considering the tower conference is giving their full network experience of expect that a lot of for people joining us that's great and will there be time to network with the speakers and the exhibitors and can you talk a little bit about you know who are the main sponsors and exhibitors of the conference oh yes of course in terms of

6:55for networking with our sponsors and exhibitors so yeah we will have her baby meeting room at the platform with the least talk for all our sponsors speaker its investors and other attendees reserve aap tickets where people can easily schedule their meetings they can request the business cards and they can extra scheduled private face-to-face conversations with a video chat or just

7:21like a phone call as the way they prefer so they can actually have some business going on over there privately the same way as we have a defined venue if I have like some private room where people can have a child conversation or is it going to like Starbucks or somewhere else also to bring up coffee and discount some soup rouser so this opportunity we have

7:44on our platform in terms of communication with example like our sponsors every virtual booth it has a video chat room so all company representatives our sponsors they will have company representatives so they're in the video chat so at least they will be able to join there and actually have a live chat with the team well so it's on the same waves they're coming to a

8:12point venue they passing by is a boost and they want to talk to the team the same way is it coming to the digital poll they are passing by virtually by the booze they feel free to join any booze they want and doctors a team and ask them some questions that's great I'm so far as three and in terms of sponsors so I wanted to mention that we have are such big names

8:37as kaspersky is one of the larger cyber security companies also we have our such big names as our scale – secret joined us as sponsors for become digital and have many startup songs at the forest interested in fundraising and also trying to promote their business and it's a very useful and great to talk to them and know something more was going on in the

9:07industry that's great and I'd love to hear a little bit more about those startup demo days that you're talking about are there still spots for startups to apply what does that look like do they get to do a presentation in front of the attendees or in front of investors and is there room for them to connect oh yeah sure let me tell you more so in terms of startups demo day

9:30yes I do still have a few slots left and for start-up demand a package charge these companies they're getting caboose at the main conference hall with their general information so they can actually promote their projects are to all people attending the conference and as an add-on they get another boost since I stopped them at they all there is II can

9:52place investors facing information and this boost will be only available to investors before is there can be still some sensitive information that they don't want to show to other people but investors only that's why we do due diligence so we check we manually give our investors access to Buster's because we have to do the background check in terms of their pitching's also getting

10:16the pitching slot that will be online they will have ten minutes for presentation than 15 minutes for Q&A from VC funds and they will have a five minutes from our mentors so to provide the feedback and of course we understand that we are 48 hours non-stop right and many investors they will not be able to join some particular time so the course of the time difference that's

10:42why after the pitching we do we do the recording of the pitching and after pitching is over replace it that their booths inside startup them they hold to make sure that all the investors they can make sure access and I still get in touch with these projects very cool I'm looking forward to this can you please remind me and the audience when exactly

11:06is the date of the start of the event the cutoff of registration and are there tickets available and how do we get access to those tickets right now oh yeah sure so we start on May 25th at 9:00 a.m. Hong Kong time so for example for Argentina it will be on 24 is at 10 p.m. for New York will be on 24 is at 9 p.m. so people should be careful reading the

11:33timezone but on our website you can see the live countdown we do still have our tickets available as our doors are open for everyone but don't have our limit the forest for online conference right we can fit as many people as we want and we want first to welcome everyone charisma wanna drive this blockchain adoption Poyser and welcome new faces to come to the field they can register on

12:03our website that is digital and get very ticket great I'll leave the link to block off digital in the links in the description below and this is so exciting Elena I'm really excited for this event because there's a lot of great speakers and to be able to simulate the networking is something that is highly appreciated so let's follow up after the event but until then

12:29best of luck moving forward with the event and I'll see there Thank You log and thanks again for inviting me today