Simit Naik: nChain’s ComplexCon Hong Kong app a landmark for blockchain adoption

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ComplexCon Hong Kong was the global festival’s first event in Asia and was a massive success. Beyond the art, music, fashion and food, the event was the perfect venue for testing how blockchain technology can transform event experiences by underpinning a “phygital” wonderland, says nChain’s Simit Naik.

Naik is the Director of Strategy at the London-based global tech firm. Speaking to CoinGeek Backstage reporter Claire Celdran on the sidelines of the event, he discussed why having blockchain in the background is essential for the technology’s future.

ComplexCon Hong Kong attracted over 30,000 attendees, most of whom used a blockchain-powered mobile app developed by nChain.

“The primary benefit of the app is to provide the attendees with a better experience, drive loyalty to ComplexCon [Hong Kong] and some of the exhibiting brands and also give us better insight into what people want,” Naik stated.

The app allowed attendees to create a digital collectible of their tickets and access certain exclusive features. It also presented useful bits of information, such as exclusive drops from some of the designers or exciting presentations at various stands.

nChain focused on delivering a smooth and intuitive user experience rather than marketing blockchain technology. However, everyone who created a digital collectible of their ticket had essentially minted a non-fungible token (NFT).

“We’ve onboarded thousands of people onto the Web3 journey without them even knowing, and for us, it’s super important because we want to make sure that this technology is always in the background,” Naik told CoinGeek Backstage.

While the event offered a small sample size, Naik believes it helped “validate that what we’re building and the technology we’re using is scalable.” At any one point, thousands of people were using the app, and it handled the traffic seamlessly.

Scalability has been the Achilles heel for most blockchain networks. BTC is still stuck on seven transactions per second, while Ethereum, despite migrating to proof of stake (PoS), still lacks the scaling ability for non-crypto use.

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