It's been a little over a week since Consensus 2024 in Austin, and now that I'm finally less jetlagged, it's time for some reflections! This was our first conference as vlayer, and it was a significant milestone for us.
What an experience – over 15,000 attendees, amazing speakers, booths overflowing with colorful merchandise, and plenty of side events (including some epic parties). I met so many incredible people, and since making friends in a fun environment is the best way to go, I took full advantage and had FUN.
But let’s focus on business.
Here are three highlights from Consensus 2024:
Launch Announcement: Seeing our co-founders, Hubert and Marek, on the “Spotlight Stage” announcing vlayer was an absolute thrill! The sparkle in people's eyes when they heard about vlayer was incredibly rewarding and motivating. They highlighted key inefficiencies of smart contracts, such as its structural disconnection from the petabytes of private web2 data siloed on centralized clouds, the computational constraints of smart contracts limiting on-chain data processing (web3), and the reluctance of companies and consumers to publicize their private data on-chain.
At vlayer, we address these inefficiencies by building an all-in-one infrastructure layer that allows developers to extract, verify, and integrate real-world data into Ethereum smart contracts as trustless, anonymous claims. Using zero-knowledge proofs, vlayer can verify data from web2 apps, email, and blockchain sources. It feels like we are doing a great job building impactful infrastructure for Ethereum and all EVM-compatible chains!
Panel Discussions: The fantastic panel discussions! Of course, the most important interaction for us was our panel featuring Cooper Kunz from Aztec Labs and Usman Asim from Ava Labs, who shared their developer experiences and confirmed what we already knew – excellent customer experience should be every company’s top priority. We’re doubling down on it!
Not to mention seeing some of the top names on stage, like Sreeram Kannan, CEO of EigenLayer, and Mike Silagadze, CEO of Etherfi, discussing the ‘Liquid Staking and Restaking Explosion’, moderated by Marcin Kazimierczak from RedStone. The audience was also excited to see Chris Dixon in-person and have him sign his latest book, 'Read, Write, Own'.
Panel Discussions
Networking and Meetings: The main goal at Consensus was to get the word out about vlayer and see what's happening in the space. I have to say, it was a huge success! We chatted with a lot of people, picked up some great insights, and made some awesome connections. I scheduled many meetings with individuals from different backgrounds – gaming, DeFi, several founders, but also some developers. There were also amazing events aimed at women, allowing us to network in a female-friendly environment.
Iweta & Marek from the vlayer team
But Consensus wasn’t just about work—it was also a whole lot of fun.
Getting to sit in a Cybertruck on the grounds of a beautiful house where a side event was held was quite an experience (and a genius marketing strategy since everyone was taking pictures). In general, Austin seemed to be the Cybertruck capital of the world. You could see them everywhere!
Not to mention that I’ve seen the DeLorean time machine! I wish I could get in and buy some Bitcoins in 2010…
DeLorean
And the city itself is incredible – I had a wonderful walk around Lady Bird Lake, visited the Capitol, enjoyed a bar with live music, and tried on some boots at Allen’s Boots! Not to mention the tons of food I had at the famous BBQ spots in Austin!
There were some complications with me returning to Europe. Not only because I had such fun, but also because the weather in Austin seemed determined to keep us there, leading to a few flight cancellations… in a row! So, I ended up staying a few extra days (which wasn’t so bad, as you can imagine ;)). Hope everyone else got home safely and had enough time to recharge their batteries!
We couldn't imagine a better conference to announce vlayer. It was a great learning experience and an amazing start, and now we are looking forward to the next few events.
Let’s connect!
Were you at Consensus 2024 too? We'd love to hear your thoughts and experiences! Join the conversation by following us on Twitter and joining our newly released Discord.
If you're interested in using vlayer or have any questions, please fill out this form to get in touch with us. Let's keep the momentum going and build the future of Web3 together!
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