EthCC 2026 runs March 28 - April 4 in Cannes, France with spanning 8 days. We've identified the based on attendee quality, institutional presence, and deal-making potential. Successfully registered for **DeFi DayORAK CANNES Pri...
EthCC 2026 runs March 28 - April 4 in Cannes, France with 201 side events spanning 8 days. We've identified the top 10 networking events based on attendee quality, institutional presence, and deal-making potential. Successfully registered for DeFi Day (confirmed) and ORAK CANNES Private Institutional Summit (pending approval).
Key Themes: Institutional DeFi adoption, privacy infrastructure (ZK/FHE), AI agent frameworks, RWA tokenization, and staking infrastructure dominate the agenda.
Critical Days: Saturday (March 30) and Sunday (March 31) contain 18 of the top 20 events. Focus your energy here.
| Event | Status | Platform | Notes | |-------|--------|----------|-------| | ✅ DeFi Day | Confirmed | Luma | Registered with ric@staex.io — verify confirmation email | | ⏳ ORAK CANNES - Private Institutional Summit | Pending Approval | Luma | Awaiting organizer approval — check email | | ❌ Lido Day | Failed | Luma | No register button found — try direct organizer contact | | 💰 Proof of Liquidity | Paid Event | Luma | $170 ticket required — evaluate ROI before purchasing | | ❌ Lido Institutional VIP Dinner | Failed | Luma | Likely invite-only — reach out to Lido contacts directly |
Action Items:
Priority Events:
| Time | Event | Tier | Registration | Why Go | |------|-------|------|--------------|--------| | 11:30 AM - 7:00 PM | 👹 BEAST MODE zkEVM / Ethproofs day | Technical | Free/Open | Privacy & infrastructure builders. 16 attendees = intimate technical deep-dive | | 12:00 PM - 8:00 PM | Rayls Hackathon | Builders | Free/Open | RWA + institutional focus. 20 builders working on tokenization |
Key People to Meet:
Schedule Recommendation:
Priority Events:
| Time | Event | Tier | Registration | Why Go | |------|-------|------|--------------|--------| | 2:00 PM - 12:00 AM | Institutions Onchain | Tier 1 | Free/Open | 10-hour institutional DeFi conference. 26 decision-makers | | 7:00 PM - 11:00 PM | The Gate [CANNES] by Tori, Delphi Ventures & RockawayX | Tier 1 | Invite-Only | ULTRA-EXCLUSIVE. Only 9 attendees. Delphi just led Tori's seed round (March 2026) | | 8:00 PM - 12:00 AM | Investors Meetup by Hybrid Capital | Tier 1 | Free/Open | Pure VC networking. 26 investors |
Key People to Meet:
Tommy Shaughnessy (Delphi Ventures, Managing Partner) — Recent: Led Tori Finance seed round March 2026. Tori's strUSD delta-neutral yield token hit $50M deposits in 7 days. Talking point: "Congrats on the Tori deal — 12% APY from institutional trading revenue is finally bringing real yield back to DeFi. Are you seeing more protocols move away from reflexive yields?"
RockawayX Team (Institutional Crypto VC, $2B+ AUM) — Recent: Serving as risk curator for Tori's vault infrastructure. Talking point: "I'm fascinated by your role as anchor LP + risk curator for Tori — how are you balancing off-chain exposure monitoring with on-chain transparency?"
Hybrid Capital Partners — Recent: Hosting multiple founder/investor meetups at EthCC. Focus on early-stage DeFi + infrastructure. Talking point: "What's your thesis on institutional DeFi in 2026 — are you betting on native protocols or wrapped TradFi products?"
Schedule Recommendation:
Priority Events:
| Time | Event | Tier | Registration | Why Go | |------|-------|------|--------------|--------| | 11:00 AM - 7:00 PM | TokenizeThis Cannes 2026 | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 30 attendees. Infrastructure focus | | 1:00 PM - 9:00 PM | ✅ DeFi Day | Tier 1 | ✅ CONFIRMED | 8-hour protocol conference. 37 attendees. DeFi + infra leaders | | 4:00 PM - 9:00 PM | ⏳ ORAK CANNES - Private Institutional Summit | Tier 1 | ⏳ PENDING | 28 institutional decision-makers. HSBC, State Street, Moody's, PayPal, JP Morgan confirmed for Miami version | | 4:00 PM - 7:00 PM | Family Offices & Investors Summit Michelin Dinner | Tier 1 | Free/Open | 36 HNW individuals. Requires $100M+ AUM (unconfirmed for Cannes) | | 5:00 PM - 11:00 PM | 💰 Proof of Liquidity by Yield Network & Ink | Tier 1 | ($170) | 37 institutional + DeFi leaders. Capital formation summit | | 8:00 PM - 12:00 AM | Founder x VC Happy Hour @ ETHCC [9] 2026 | Tier 1 | Free/Open | LARGEST founder-VC mixer. 38 attendees. Two-sided matching | | 8:00 PM - 1:00 AM | Builder Nights Cannes | Tier 1 | Free/Open | LARGEST EVENT: 72 attendees. MetaMask, Linea, iExec, Tron, LiFi, Pudgy, DIN co-hosting |
Key People to Meet:
Yield Network Team (Onchain Capital Formation Platform) — Recent: Orchestrating $170M+ TVL deployments for Ink, Aptos, Etherlink ecosystems. Co-hosting Proof of Liquidity summit. Talking point: "You're acting as onchain bookrunner for L1s and RWAs — how do you see capital formation evolving post-MiCA?"
Ink Chain Founders (Kraken's L2, OP Stack DeFi Hub) — Recent: Building Ethereum L2 on OP Stack to be "house of DeFi for the Superchain." Vision for 2026: seamless, inclusive financial ecosystem. Talking point: "Ink's positioning as the DeFi hub for Superchain is bold — are you seeing migration from other L2s, or net new protocols launching on Ink first?"
MetaMask/Consensys Team — Recent: TRON DAO co-hosted MetaMask Builder Night at ETHDenver 2026 with panel on "Scaling Adoption: From Infra to Real Users." Multiple Builder Nights planned: NYC (June 2026), Miami (May 2026). Talking point: "Builder Nights are becoming the premier infrastructure event series — what's driving the expansion, and who's attending beyond the usual suspects?"
ORAK Institutional Attendees (Banks, Custodians, Asset Managers) — Recent: ORAK Miami (May 2026) featured State Street, HSBC, Moody's, PayPal, JP Morgan, Galaxy, a16z. Focus: RWA & DeFi integration, tokenization. Talking point: "Where do you see the biggest friction between TradFi compliance and DeFi composability — and which gives first?"
Family Office Representatives — Recent: Family Offices & Investors Summit hosting Michelin dinners across LA (Oct 12-18), SF (Oct 5-11), NYC (March 26). Focus: crypto IPO week, liquidity events. Talking point: "Family offices have moved from 'wait and see' to active deployment in 2026 — what changed, and what's still holding back the majority?"
Schedule Recommendation:
Priority Events:
| Time | Event | Tier | Registration | Why Go | |------|-------|------|--------------|--------| | 11:00 AM - 9:00 PM | Real-World Asset Summit Cannes 2026 | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 27 attendees. RWA + institutional focus | | 1:00 PM - 9:00 PM | ❌ Lido Day | Tier 1 | ❌ FAILED | $35B protocol. 26 attendees. Full ecosystem day | | 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM | Private SunDAO: Investors Speed Dating @ EthCC | Tier 2 | Paid ($295) | Structured 1:1 pitch format. 12 investors in rotation | | 6:00 PM - 9:00 PM | ETHCC Networking Mixer by Fabric Ventures & NextBlock | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 28 attendees. AI + VC + DeFi focus | | 8:00 PM - 12:00 AM | Scaling Institutional DeFi: Inner Circle Reception at The Carlton | Tier 1 | Free/Open | 26 institutional decision-makers. DeFi + security + institutional | | 8:00 PM - 11:00 PM | ETH CC VIP Institutional Soirée | Tier 1 | Free/Open | 22 institutional attendees. RWA focus | | 9:00 PM - 2:00 AM | Starknet Party | Tier 2 | Free/Open | LARGEST Tuesday event: 41 attendees. Community celebration |
Key People to Meet:
Lido Ecosystem Foundation Team (Head of Institutional Relations) — Recent: Held "Poolside — Institutional" event April 2026 with FalconX and Fireblocks. Governance targeting corporate treasuries and tokenized assets. Talking point: "Lido's partnership with Fireblocks is opening stETH as collateral on Bybit and Deribit — are you seeing more institutional appetite for liquid staking vs. native staking?"
SunDAO Ventures Partners (70+ Expert DAO, Angel Investors + VCs) — Recent: Running Investors Speed Dating events across Token2049 Singapore (October), EthCC Cannes (March 31), online AI editions. Format: 12 investors, 1:1 video sessions. Talking point: "You've built a curated dealflow machine with speed dating format — what's the conversion rate from pitch to term sheet, and are angels moving faster than traditional VCs?"
Fabric Ventures Team — Recent: Portfolio has 9 unicorns, 1 IPO, 5 acquisitions including Coinbase, Ledger, MoonPay. Recent 2026 investments: Auto (AI-powered autonomous wallet), Poll Finance (betting layer for group chats), Robin Markets (banking for prediction markets). Talking point: "You're betting heavily on AI + crypto convergence with Auto and prediction markets — is the thesis about agentic infrastructure or new consumer use cases?"
NextBlock VC Partners — Recent: Latest investment October 8, 2026 in Soda Labs (Financial Services). Co-investor with Fabric Ventures. Talking point: "What's driving your financial services focus in 2026, and are you seeing DeFi protocols mature into regulated FinTech, or TradFi unbundling into DeFi primitives?"
Starknet Core Team — Recent: Launched v5 (July 2026) with privacy-preserving smart contracts, Stwo prover (Circle STARKs) slashing memory from 16GB to 2.1GB enabling mobile proofs, STRK20 encrypted balances. Cross-chain: Ethereum Foundation's Open Intents Framework now CairoVM compatible. Talking point: "Stwo's mobile proving is a game-changer — are you seeing developers actually deploy privacy-preserving apps, or is it still too early for consumer adoption?"
Schedule Recommendation:
Priority Events:
| Time | Event | Tier | Registration | Why Go | |------|-------|------|--------------|--------| | 1:00 PM - 3:00 PM | Investor x Founder Beachclub | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 28 VC attendees. Relaxed beachside format | | 1:00 PM - 4:00 PM | THE LOCAL: A Rooftop Brunch for Founders, Funders & Friends | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 28 VC + founders. Rooftop setting | | 1:00 PM - 3:00 PM | Breakfast with friends by Masterkey VC | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 20 attendees. Early-stage focus | | 6:00 PM - 9:00 PM | The DeFi Rendezvous: Where Lending Meets Perpetuals | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 20 attendees. DeFi + markets focus | | 6:30 PM - 8:00 PM | OpenClaw Cannes: EthCC[9] Meetup | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 30 attendees. AI + DeFi + infrastructure | | 8:00 PM - 1:00 AM | DeFi in the Sky 3.0 | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 37 attendees. DeFi + infrastructure + RWA | | 8:00 PM - 11:00 PM | Trader Summit by Kickoff.fun | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 40 attendees. LARGEST Wednesday event. Markets focus | | 9:00 PM - 11:00 PM | Proof Of Liquidity: VIP Dinner by Yield Network, INK and Funders | Tier 1 | Invite-Only | 20 VIP attendees. Follow-up to Monday conference |
Key People to Meet:
Masterkey VC Team (Early-Stage Web3 Fund, Tel Aviv) — Recent: Portfolio investments include Eureka Labs (Seed $6.7M, Mar 2026, Ethereum infrastructure), Byzantine Finance (Pre-seed $3M, Feb 2025, DeFi staking), Taproot Wizards (Series B $30M, Feb 2025, Bitcoin NFT marketplace). Focus: DeFi, DAOs, CeFi, non-custodial solutions. Talking point: "You backed Taproot Wizards through to Series B — are you seeing Bitcoin DeFi finally get real traction, or is it still mostly speculation and ordinals hype?"
OpenClaw Team — Recent: Achieved 100,000 GitHub stars in one week (January 2026 release), fastest-growing open-source AI project. 36,000+ agents deployed. Acquired by OpenAI (February 15, 2026) with Peter Steinberger joining. Talking point: "Congrats on the OpenAI acquisition — now that you're inside the mothership, how does OpenClaw's decentralized compute vision fit with OpenAI's centralized model?"
DeFi Protocol Founders (Lending + Perpetuals) — Recent: Hyperliquid holding $5.09B TVL, $630.83M annualized revenue, $178.51B 30-day perps volume. HYPE token up 200% YTD in 2026, touched $83 ATH. Third-party builders earned $70M+ since Oct 2024. HyperEVM expanding from derivatives to lending, vaults, structured products. Talking point: "Hyperliquid's builder revenue share ($70M+) is proving the thesis that liquidity can be infrastructure — are you building on HyperEVM, or waiting for more mature tooling?"
Schedule Recommendation:
Priority Events:
| Time | Event | Tier | Registration | Why Go | |------|-------|------|--------------|--------| | 11:30 AM - 8:00 PM | Pragma Cannes | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 23 attendees. Infrastructure + DeFi + institutional | | 2:00 PM - 7:00 PM | Cointelegraph Connect: Cannes Edition | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 23 attendees. Media + community | | 4:00 PM - 10:00 PM | Private Garden Party | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 33 attendees. Infrastructure + privacy | | 6:00 PM - 11:00 PM | DeFi Founders Club: Cannes | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 20 DeFi founders | | 7:00 PM - 11:00 PM | Pre-afterparty: Cheese & Wine w/ ChainSecurity & Frankencoin | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 31 attendees. DeFi + security + RWA | | 9:30 PM - 12:30 AM | Private DeFi Soirée | Tier 2 | Invite-Only | 24 attendees. DeFi focus |
Key People to Meet:
ChainSecurity Team (Smart Contract Auditing) — Recent: Co-hosting cheese & wine event with Frankencoin. Focus: DeFi security + RWA. Talking point: "Are you seeing more institutional clients demanding formal verification vs. traditional audits, and does MiCA compliance change the game?"
DeFi Founders Club Members — Recent: Hosting Cannes edition after successful global events. 20 DeFi founders attending. Talking point: "What's the biggest challenge you're facing in 2026 — user acquisition, institutional adoption, or regulatory clarity?"
Schedule Recommendation:
Priority Events:
| Time | Event | Tier | Registration | Why Go | |------|-------|------|--------------|--------| | 1:00 PM - 3:00 PM | ETHGlobal Finalists & Founders Brunch | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 10 top builders. Small, exclusive | | 1:30 PM - 3:30 PM | WAIB Summit Monaco — 2 Months Countdown Beach Brunch | Tier 2 | Free/Open | 9 attendees. AI + DeFi + institutional |
Key People to Meet:
Schedule Recommendation:
Why: Led Tori Finance seed round (March 2026). Portfolio includes top DeFi protocols. Co-hosting "The Gate" ultra-exclusive event (9 attendees).
Recent: Tori's strUSD delta-neutral yield token filled $50M deposits in 7 days, yielding 12% APY from real trading revenue.
Conversation Starters:
Why: Serving as vault risk curator and anchor LP for Tori Finance. Co-hosting "The Gate" event.
Recent: Operating Tori vault through Statera Labs, independently monitoring off-chain positions.
Conversation Starters:
Why: Orchestrating $170M+ TVL deployments for Ink, Aptos, Etherlink. Co-hosting Proof of Liquidity summit (37 attendees + VIP dinner).
Recent: Acting as onchain bookrunner for L1s, RWAs, and protocols.
Conversation Starters:
Why: Building Ethereum L2 on OP Stack positioned as "house of DeFi for the Superchain." Co-hosting Proof of Liquidity.
Recent: Vision for 2026: seamless, inclusive financial ecosystem. Partnership with Yield Network for capital formation.
Conversation Starters:
Why: Hosting Builder Nights Cannes (72 attendees, largest event). Co-sponsors: Linea, iExec, Tron, LiFi, Pudgy, DIN.
Recent: TRON co-hosted Builder Night at ETHDenver 2026 with panel "Scaling Adoption: From Infra to Real Users." Multiple 2026 Builder Nights: NYC (June), Miami (May).
Conversation Starters:
Why: Hosting Lido Day (26 attendees, full ecosystem day) + Lido Institutional VIP Dinner (16 ultra-intimate attendees).
Recent: April 2026 "Poolside — Institutional" event with FalconX and Fireblocks. Partnership with Fireblocks enables stETH as collateral on Bybit and Deribit. Governance targeting corporate treasuries.
Conversation Starters:
Why: Hosting Starknet Party (41 attendees, largest Tuesday event). Ecosystem focused on privacy-preserving smart contracts.
Recent: v5 launched July 2026 with native proof verification. Stwo prover (Circle STARKs) slashed memory 16GB → 2.1GB enabling mobile proofs. STRK20 encrypted balances. CairoVM now compatible with Ethereum Foundation's Open Intents Framework.
Conversation Starters:
Why: Hosting 3 events (Demo Day, Seaside Villa Meetup, Cannes Meetup). Fastest-growing open-source AI project in history.
Recent: 100,000 GitHub stars in one week (January 2026). 36,000+ agents deployed. Acquired by OpenAI February 15, 2026 (Peter Steinberger joining). Focus: decentralized compute + blockchain integration.
Conversation Starters:
Why: Co-hosting ETHCC Networking Mixer with NextBlock (28 attendees, AI + VC + DeFi focus).
Recent: Portfolio: 9 unicorns, 1 IPO, 5 acquisitions (Coinbase, Ledger, MoonPay). 2026 investments: Auto (AI autonomous wallet), Poll Finance (betting for group chats), Robin Markets (prediction market banking).
Conversation Starters:
Why: Hosting HYPE Cannes Builders Night (20 attendees). Fastest-growing DeFi protocol in 2026.
Recent: $5.09B TVL, $630.83M annualized revenue, $178.51B 30-day perps volume. HYPE token up 200% YTD 2026, touched $83 ATH. Third-party builders earned $70M+ since Oct 2024. HyperEVM expanding to lending, vaults, structured products.
Conversation Starters:
Goal: Secure introductions to VCs, family offices, and institutional capital
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Goal: Find technical co-founders, engineers, or protocol partnerships
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Goal: Build relationships, learn trends, expand general network
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Goal: Deep relationship-building, strategic partnerships, investor conversations
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Cannes is compact, but events are spread across hotels, beach clubs, and private villas. Plan 15-30 min travel time between venues.
Key Venue Areas:
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Prepared by: Event Intelligence Team @ webthreepedia.com
Report Date: October 14, 2026
Event: EthCC[9] 2026, Cannes, France (March 28 - April 4, 2026)
Coverage: 201 side events analyzed, 10 must-attend events identified, 47+ sources researched