Stellar, an OG Layer 1 founded in 2014, just wrapped up its flagship annual conference, where the focus was on growing its decentralized finance (DeFi) and real-world assets (RWA) ecosystems.

The Meridian conference by Stellar held in Rio de Janeiro Sept. 17-18, came on the heels of the chain’s Protocol 23 upgrade, also known as “whisk.” The technical upgrade, which is aimed at making the chain cheaper and faster, was shipped a year after Stellar’s Soroban upgrade, which added smart contracts.

Armed with smart contracts and improved scalability, the Stellar ecosystem is tackling the industry’s most pressing use cases, with stablecoin adoption, real-world asset tokenization, and blockchain-based solutions to address real-life problems. These were the themes at the forefront of the panel conversations and hallway chatter at the Copacabana Palace, where the confernece took place.

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