We’re building something ambitious: a Network that solves the scalability challenge facing blockchain. It’s an amazing opportunity, but also presents one of our biggest hurdles — figuring out how to help people understand what we do and the value it brings to them.

That’s where I come in! My name is Connie Kwan and I’ve recently joined as VP of Product at OmiseGO. I have over 15 years of experience in product management, mostly in Enterprise SaaS companies. In my role, I want to be the voice of the marketplace and tell a story through our products.

While I’ve always worked in technology, blockchain is a different beast altogether, which is why on my third week here I went to the San Francisco Blockchain Week (SFBW). What better way to immerse into OmiseGO than to dive deeper into the technology it’s built on, right?

Here’s what I got up to at the event!

Getting up to Speed

The first session I attended was called “The Real Crypto Oracles!” It was fantastic and I had the chance to watch Dan Morehead of Pantera, Mike Novogratz of Galaxy Digital, and Joseph Lubin from Consensys discuss the nuances of blockchain live on stage.

Blockchain…for Gaming?

I also sat in on a talk about Blockchain for gaming, where I learned that true-ownership of in-game assets is a problem to be solved.

With blockchain, players no longer have to adhere to the game creator’s economics but can derive how much each item is worth independently. This means a gamer can simply trade their Gold Shield to get that stat-padded Armor they’ve always wanted instead of grinding for it!

Given that these trades are already happening on the black market, game-developers stand to gain by providing a white-market for these transactions. It’s a win-win for everyone.

Blockchain for Enterprise!

Aah enterprise at SFBW, now that’s more like it!

In this talk, panelists from GE Aviation, World Economic Forum, and Microsoft agreed on a few points about working with enterprises that are adopting blockchain. They wanted to:

Engage regulators and lawyers at the enterprise early in the process
Move away from the lingo of Blockchain, and instead, talk about customer value such as:

increased trust and security
de-risking the value chain
communicating across the value chain
being the source of truth
portable identity
efficiency

Final Thoughts on the SFBW

The SFBW reminded me that while Blockchain is a transformative technology, to encourage more adoption, we need to translate its value to real-user terms.

Because when done right, the results are astronomical. For example, when XBox’s Loyalty management program moved to the Blockchain it saved Microsoft $2M in the first quarter of implementation and required half the previous staff. However, the actual Blockchain portion was only 10% of the final solution.

As an industry, we still have a ways to go in the adoption curve, but the good news? We are well-positioned to make a huge difference.