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Buenos Aires Community Workshops — November 2025

Introduction​

In November 2025, two major community workshops were held in Buenos Aires as part of the Cardano 2030 Vision and Strategy engagement process. The first session took place on November 15 at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) during the Cardano Summit, bringing together ecosystem contributors, university students, educators, developers, researchers, and new community members to explore infrastructure readiness, adoption pathways, research priorities, and regional opportunities. The second session, held on November 16 at the IO Office in Buenos Aires, gathered one of the largest and most diverse regional and international groups to date, with participation from across Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Chile, Venezuela, Colombia, as well as contributors from Mexico, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, and members of Intersect leadership. This report consolidates the insights from both workshops and reflects the collective regional and global perspective on Cardano’s long-term direction.

The Workshop — November 15 (University of Buenos Aires)​

The November 15 session convened developers, builders, students, academics, and industry participants to discuss the foundational elements of the Cardano 2030 Vision, including infrastructure, research, adoption, real-world use cases, and local ecosystem development. Discussions were facilitated through interactive group dynamics, strategic prompts, and thematic conversations.

Key Learnings and Insights — November 15​

Foundation: Infrastructure & Research Excellence​

Technical Robustness​

Participants reinforced the importance of strengthening Cardano’s core infrastructure:

  • Ongoing L1 improvements and maturing Layer-2 solutions.
  • Interoperability and Zero-Knowledge Proofs as strategic differentiators.

Operational Resilience​

Key themes included:

  • Alternative node implementations in widely used languages.
  • Increasing Block Producer diversity to reduce centralization risks.
  • Diverse and decentralized APIs and services.
  • Post-quantum readiness as a long-term requirement.

Protocol Security​

  • Continuous threat detection, monitoring, and permanent audits due to Cardano’s financial nature.

Invisible Technology​

  • Cardano must become invisible to end users, similar to mainstream payment networks or internet protocols.

Research and Academia​

  • Research excellence is one of Cardano’s strongest competitive advantages.
  • Universities serve as core talent engines and hubs for experimentation and adoption.

Pillar 1: Adoption & Utility​

User Experience (Business & Consumer)​

  • UX must be simple (“designed for a grandmother”).
  • Wallets must prioritize clarity: send, receive, check balance.
  • Solutions should solve real-world problems rather than explain blockchain.

Use Cases and Productive Sectors​

  • Prioritize useful transactions over raw volume.
  • Healthcare identified as an emerging opportunity.

Anchor Solutions​

  • High interest in anchor products that spark broader ecosystem adoption.

Developer Experience​

  • Need for comparative ETH→Cardano courses.
  • Migration guides for JS, Python, Rust → Aiken/Plutus.
  • Developers requested better conceptual bridges and analogies.

Stablecoins and Financial Usability​

  • Strong demand for USDT/USDC presence.
  • Growing interest in Babel Fees.

Community, Governance & Promotion​

  • The community should amplify adoption and governance participation.
  • Greater engagement with productive sectors and government.
  • Mission and vision should be validated with the global community.

Communication & Marketing​

  • Marketing should highlight real problems solved, not technical features.
  • Messaging must align with each sector’s vocabulary.

Ultra-Clear Summary — November 15​

Infrastructure​

  • Robust L1
  • Advanced L2
  • Interoperability + ZKPs
  • Continuous security
  • Node + language diversity
  • Post-quantum readiness
  • Invisible tech
  • Academic integration

Adoption​

  • Simple UX
  • Priority verticals: DeFi, RWA, Supply Chain, Payments, and Healthcare
  • Useful transactions
  • Developer migration
  • Stablecoins + Babel Fees
  • Community involvement
  • Problem-centric marketing

The Workshop — November 16 (IO Office)​

The November 16 workshop gathered a large and diverse LATAM + international delegation, representing nearly every major region of the ecosystem. Participants joined from Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Chile, Venezuela, Colombia, Mexico, USA, Canada, UK, Belgium, Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, and Intersect leadership.

This produced one of the most comprehensive multi-region dialogues held in the ecosystem to date, centered on governance maturity, adoption strategy, business development, technical growth, and Cardano’s positioning as mission-critical infrastructure. The support from the Buenos Aires IO Office was a major highlight.

Key Learnings and Insights — November 16​

Mission and Vision Refinement​

Participants emphasized:

  • The need for a unified long-term mission.
  • Continued commitment to scalability, security, and research excellence.
  • Clear articulation of Cardano’s role in solving high-value real-world problems.
  • Cardano must position itself as mission-critical infrastructure.
  • Decentralized and diverse APIs and services such as Koios, Blockfrost, and Dandelion.

Pillar 1 — Adoption & Utility​

A.2 Business & Consumer Experience​

  • Support financial inclusion using Cardano’s global availability, reliable data, and low-cost infrastructure, especially across LATAM and Africa.
  • Integrate USDT/USDC to match consumer payment norms, particularly in high-inflation markets.
  • Create onboarding paths tailored to consumer, merchant, enterprise, and developer segments.
  • Communicate Cardano as an ethical, transparent, and sustainable blockchain that avoids exploitative use of VR and AI.
  • Expand real-world consumer touchpoints to drive adoption in the everyday money economy.

A.3 Enterprise Experience / Business Development​

  • Recognize Business Development as a core driver of ecosystem adoption and design a structured BD program for enterprises, governments, and B2B integrations.
  • Strengthen enterprise-grade support: security best practices, compliance guidance, architectural reviews.
  • Research and propose improvements to staking aligned with decentralization and incentives.
  • Expand modular ZK infrastructure for privacy-preserving enterprise applications and scalable L2s.
  • Produce policy papers and sector-specific positioning materials aligned with BD strategy.
  • Deliver ETH→Cardano migration courses with clear toolchain and mental-model mappings.
  • Align APPT to accelerate discovery and unblock enterprise adoption.
  • Treat hackathons, dev clubs, and universities as strategic BD pipelines for enterprise-ready talent.

A.3 Developer Experience​

  • Make stablecoins readily available for developers to test payments and build financial apps.
  • Provide structured ETH→Cardano migration tracks.
  • Expand ALBA Labs and university innovation hubs to accelerate onboarding.
  • Launch a talent marketplace matching developers with teams, projects, and ecosystem opportunities.
  • Bridge developer teams with BD pipelines to help them reach markets and partners.

Pillar 2 — Governance​

G.1 Incentivized & Accessible Governance​

  • Create incentives to increase governance participation among top dApps, especially consumer-facing ones.
  • Improve DRep voting distribution through wider delegation and better tooling for voter discovery.
  • Strengthen value-aligned governance by prioritizing real utility (e.g., RWAs) over superficial metrics like TVL.
  • Establish a Business Development Academy linking governance education to real deployment opportunities.
  • Use daily transactions as a shared KPI across governance and adoption strategies.

Pillar 3 — Community & Ecosystem Growth​

C.1 Talent Acquisition & Retention​

  • Build education pipelines with universities across LATAM (UBA, UTN, University of Chile).
  • Use hackathons, dev clubs, and blockchain labs (e.g., ALBA Labs) to attract and train new talent.
  • Support hands-on training for Cardano tooling and ETH→Cardano skill migration.
  • Create a LATAM-centric talent marketplace to connect contributors with teams and projects.

C.2 Global Engagement & Market Adoption​

  • Strengthen external perception by showcasing interoperability, ZK capabilities, L2 roadmap, and mission-critical reliability.
  • Build cross-ecosystem bridges with ETH dev communities and tooling providers.
  • Develop regional strategies without geographic bias.
  • Target LATAM and Africa with transparent vendor-selection mechanisms, supply chain solutions, and payment integrations (USDT/USDC particularly relevant in Argentina).
  • Concerns expressed regarding biased region-preselected adoption models.
  • Vendor selection mechanisms were identified as high-impact opportunities in LATAM.

C.3 Institutional Adoption​

  • Combine technical development with business development for real institutional solutions.
  • Recognize Argentina’s strong developer talent pool.
  • Proposal raised for an institutional-level BD Strategy Chapter.

C.4 Market Expansion (Community-Derived Category)​

Focus Area: Ecosystem Expansion Through Collaboration​

  • Collaborate with multi-chain communities, host cross-ecosystem hackathons, attract developers via university hubs.

Focus Area: Growth KPIs​

  • Use daily transactions as a measurable proxy for adoption and dApp engagement.

Pillar 4 — Sustainability & Ecosystem Resilience​

E.1 Financial Stewardship & Tokenomics​

  • Expand the treasury beyond ADA-only proposals to enable multi-asset participation.
  • Move toward an actively managed, multi-asset treasury capable of generating yield responsibly.
  • Refine tokenomics to support decentralization, stable pricing, and L1 value capture from modular ZK and L2 systems.

E.2 SPO Ecosystem​

  • Encourage SPOs to support roles beyond block production (L2 hosting, AVS, decentralized services).
  • Modernize SPO economics (min-fee, margin options, decentralization programs).
  • Maintain pool distribution targets (>500 independent pools producing ≥95% of blocks) and monitor custodial concentration.

E.3 Decentralized Services & APIs​

Focus Area: Service-Layer Decentralization​

  • Support decentralized service providers and APIs such as Koios, Blockfrost, and Dandelion.
  • Promote resilience so the ecosystem never depends on a single gateway. Expected Enhancement: Increased fault tolerance, ecosystem independence, and better developer access.

Foundation — Additional Insight (Cross-Pillars)​

“Just as we need diverse and decentralized nodes and pools, we also need diverse and decentralized APIs and services.” Examples include: Koios, Blockfrost, Dandelion — with Dandelion offering fully unlocked services for all vendors.

Universities as Catalysts for Adoption​

Participants highlighted universities as prime accelerators of sound, fast adoption, offering talent pipelines, research environments, and real-world experimentation.

Examples included:

  • University of Chile
  • Universidad Tecnológica Nacional (UTN)
  • Universidad de Buenos Aires (UBA) These institutions were identified as foundational partners for developer growth, adoption strategies, and ecosystem maturity.

Strategic Themes Identified​

  • Mission-Critical Infrastructure
  • Economic Resilience with Multi-Year Funding
  • Governance Maturity & Accountability
  • Adoption Pathways: Developer Education, Business Development, University Partnerships
  • Human-Centered Growth Across LATAM and Beyond

Conclusion​

The Buenos Aires workshops delivered one of the most diverse and insightful sets of regional contributions to the Cardano 2030 Vision and Strategy. Participants emphasized a mission grounded in security, sustainability, research excellence, and global fairness—reinforced by strong business development frameworks, university collaborations, decentralized service layers, and long-term strategies designed for LATAM and the broader global ecosystem.

These sessions showcased the depth of regional commitment and highlighted clear pathways for Cardano to scale responsibly, inclusively, and with lasting impact. Special thanks to both the AdaSolar team and the IO Office team in Buenos Aires for their dedication, thoughtfulness, and unwavering support throughout the events and the summit.

The insights gathered here directly support the refinement of the 2030 Vision and will help guide future iterations of the Cardano roadmap.

Co-Authors​

  • Juan Sierra — Product Member
  • Carlos Lopez de Lara — Product Member