Rise In, the world’s leading web3 education and acceleration platform with 400,000+ developers across 100+ countries, today announced the launch of the APAC Stellar Hackathon in partnership with the Stellar Development Foundation (SDF), a nonprofit organization creating equitable access to the global financial system through blockchain technology. Set to be one of the biggest web3 hackathons in the APAC region, the event will bring together developers, founders, and builders from across the continent.

The hackathon will run primarily online, open to developers across Southeast Asia, and supported by a regional program of developer workshops, community meetups, and university activations in Vietnam, Indonesia, and the Philippines. The program will end with an in-person finale day held simultaneously across all three countries.

Why Southeast Asia, Why Now

Southeast Asia has quietly become one of the most exciting regions in the world for web3 builders, and three things are happening at once.

The first is that regulation is finally catching up. Vietnam rolled out its first formal crypto framework in September 2025, opening the door for licensed exchanges through a five-year pilot program. Indonesia moved crypto oversight from its commodities regulator to its financial services authority (OJK) in January 2025, officially treating digital assets as financial products. Thailand approved its first spot Bitcoin ETF and is now extending the framework to other crypto assets. Singapore continues to set the institutional bar with one of the most established licensing regimes in the region.

The second is regional cooperation. Regulators in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Dubai have been drafting joint frameworks to align crypto policy across borders, a sign that APAC is being built as a connected market rather than a patchwork of disconnected jurisdictions.

The third, and probably the most important, is that people are actually using crypto. APAC is now the fastest-growing region in the world for on-chain activity, with transaction volume jumping 69% year-over-year to $2.36 trillion in the 12 months to June 2025, according to Chainalysis' 2025 Geography of Crypto Report. India, Pakistan, and Vietnam lead globally in grassroots adoption, driven by everyday use cases like remittances, dollar access via stablecoins, and mobile-first finance. These are exactly the kind of practical, user-facing problems that web3 is best positioned to solve.

Rise In x Stellar: A Growing Builder Movement

Rise In and Stellar have already shipped major developer programs together:

• The Hack Pera Hackathon in Istanbul brought together 400+ developers on June 21-22, 2025, featuring two competition tracks (Stellar Consumer dApps and Stellar DeFi & Infrastructure). The event resulted in 70+ projects at the historic Pera Palace Hotel.
• The Soroban Developer Education Program introduced 3,000+ developers in India to Stellar’s smart contract platform. As part of the initiative, Rise In successfully executed a multi-city Build-A-Thon series across 4 cities alongside an intensive 5-day builder residency program, empowering developers to build, collaborate, and ship real-world applications on Stellar.
• Stellar Journey to Mastery is a recurring monthly builder challenge program designed to help developers showcase and sharpen their skills by building innovative projects on Stellar. With a monthly prize pool and a growing community of thousands of developers joining, the program empowers builders to learn, compete, collaborate, and grow deeper within the Stellar ecosystem through consistent hands-on innovation.

What Builders Are Asked to Build

APAC Stellar Hackathon is looking for user-facing financial applications that solve real problems for real people, products with utility, not throwaway prototypes. Priority areas include:

• Cross-border payment applications powered by Stellar infrastructure
• Stablecoin-powered savings, transfers, payroll, and merchant payments
• Soroban-powered DeFi applications connected to real-world assets
• Wallets, identity, and on/off-ramp integrations that reduce friction for users
• Financial tools connected to local economies, remittances, and mobile-first markets across APAC
• Yield, lending, AMMs, DEX infrastructure, and ecosystem tooling built within Stellar

Teams are encouraged to build with composability in mind, plugging into existing wallets, DeFi protocols, and Stellar building blocks rather than reinventing the wheel.

Who Can Join

• web3 developers and builder teams
• Startup founders and early-stage teams
• Student developers
• Engineers interested in financial infrastructure
• Anyone interested in the future of finance and emerging technologies who wants to build a working product during the event.

What Participants Gain

• Up to $60K prize pool
• Technical mentorship from the Stellar ecosystem
• Hands-on developer workshops and training delivered by Rise In
• Entry into the global Stellar builder ecosystem
• Access to Stellar ecosystem opportunities, post-hackathon support, and potential grant pathways for promising teams
• Certifications from the Rise In platform

About Rise In

Rise In (risein.com) is the world’s biggest web3 education and acceleration platform with 400,000+ developers across 100+ countries. Originally founded as the largest web3 developer community in India and Turkey, Rise In has since expanded its operations across APAC countries. The platform delivers free courses, bootcamps, hackathons, and mentorship in partnership with leading blockchain protocols and ecosystems, including Stellar. In 2024, Rise In acquired BlockBeam to expand into the U.S. market and accelerate its mission of training the next generation of web3 developers.

About the Stellar Development Foundation

The Stellar Development Foundation (SDF) is a non-profit organization that supports the development and growth of Stellar, an open-source network that connects the world’s financial infrastructure. Founded in 2014, the Foundation helps maintain Stellar’s codebase, supports the technical and business communities building on the network, and serves as a voice to regulators and institutions. The Foundation seeks to create equitable access to the global financial system, using the Stellar network to unlock the world’s economic potential through blockchain technology. For more information, visit stellar.org/foundation.

Registration link: https://www.risein.com/programs/apac-stellar-hackathon

‍