A New Era for Money

Transcript

I am Jaclyn Melnick. I'm the founder and CEO of Stratia Media. And for the next 20 minutes, we're going to be talking about something that touches every single person in this room and billions outside of it. It's how money moves. Please join me in welcoming Won Suk Beck, the head of group at North America Samsung Wallet, as well as Vibu Norby, the chief product officer at Solana Foundation. And before we get into this conversation, Samsung and Solana have made a short film about what this means for people. So, let's take a look.

>> Thank you for calling. Your incoming transfer is pending. Estimated arrival, 3 to 5 business days. Transfers after 4:00 p.m. are processed the next business day. Please continue to hold. >> [music] >> Life doesn't wait. Send a little home. Start something somewhere new. What matters is who it reaches. [music] An early start, a late finish. Your day doesn't run on banking hours. On the Galaxy you trust. With you always in control.

Your life. Your money. On your time. >> Really, to start off, Samsung has spent decades putting new technology in people's pockets. Why is money the next thing that the phone has to reinvent? >> So, one of the lifestyle um Samsung is pursuing with the Samsung Wallet as the global top um smartphone manufacturer is the life without the physical wallet. So, uh namely, uh replaced our physical wallet with our devices.

So, for that purpose, we already brought um cards, ID, and even car keys into the our devices. But, one fundamental part of wallet experience uh still has not made that kind of a transition. It is the money money itself. So, looking back what is the fundamental role of the wallet, then we can imagine that um we keep the money inside the wallet, and then carry that wallet, and then take out of the money from the wallet, and then eventually give it to

someone for certain purpose. So, that being said, uh such an experience in digital wallet is a still all fragmented from technological point of view or um experience point of view. So, moving money uh particularly across the border can still mean you need to navigate through all different technology and fees and then processing times. So, opportunity for Samsung, I think that um design a such simple process to service experience, and then

make it available in Samsung Wallet, and also make it work uh naturally in Samsung Wallet. >> I know at Unpacked in July, Samsung said its wallet will supply new forms of digital value including stable coins. So, what should that experience look like for an everyday Samsung Wallet user? >> Yeah, so there is the couple of things. So, uh firstly, um they will recognize um stablecoin blockchain in the same way they recognize the card network like a Visa, MasterCard, AMEX or when they use their card. So, think about that when we use the card, we just know

that there's the Visa MasterCard. But, we don't care about how they work, what they are doing, such things. So, it will be same to the stable coin and then blockchain things. They will just know that the stable coin blockchain will be there and it just works. And then, secondly, they can start without installing additional app or creating another account or even managing private keys.

Thirdly, it should feel like any other features in Samsung Wallet. So, that means that it's the same simple experience to everyone. So, you just take out your phone and then swipe up the screen and then it will bring the Samsung Wallet and then you use the stable coin. So, that means that you can send the money across the world without being limited by the some traditional banking hours or something like that.

So, with the recipients over the 60 countries, even they can receive the money in their local currencies. So, we are starting with a cross-border transfer, but stable coin can also support the payment. So, it will creating additional practical use cases over time, I think. >> So, what would you say what would you say matters most then in making that experience feel familiar? >> It's about the starting from Um, experience and the behavior they are already familiar with.

So, Samsung wallet is aware already users put their card, ID, and then car keys. So, bringing money in the same environment, so it means that we actually build another service experience. The same as the other services they are already use in their everyday lives. >> Once again, people already trust Samsung with their photos, their health data, and their cards. So, what has to be true for these people to trust it with their digital dollars as well?

>> So, I think there's a three things. So, one is the the protections. So, at the every level there um the services, uh we need a clear protection. So, stable coin is actually held by the um our regulated custodian partner. And then um transaction only initiate uh through the devices, Samsung devices, already registered.

And then finally, it is authorized by the users um their fingerprint and the biometric authentication. So, our Samsung device and then also biometric authentication is protected by uh hardware hardware based security solution by the Samsung. It's called Knox. So, the protection is the first thing. And then second thing I think that is the simplicity. So, as I already said, um they don't need to install additional app, creating another account, no management of the um private key, those things. That's the critical.

The last one is the responsibility, I think. So, it comes with uh our obligation to regulators and partners and our users as well. So, I think that trust is the something we have to keep earning from our users as our uh wallet um getting bigger in their role in our users' everyday life for use cases. >> Maybe, I want to bring you into the conversation as well. Obviously, Visa already settles USDC on Solana for US banks, but what does the infrastructure have to do when the users are not just crypto natives, but everyone?

>> I think it has to work seamlessly in the background. Um and for everyday use, it has to deliver on a couple of promises. One, it has to be really fast. Payments that take seconds and not days. Uh it has to be low cost, so you can pay for things with a fraction of a penny, uh whether it's a you know, a coffee uh or sending a salary back home. And uh it has to never close. So, no weekends, no bank holidays, no cut-off times. If you're sending money at 3:00 a.m. on a Sunday or at noon on a Tuesday, it has to work the same way, and I think that's really what Solana has built and delivered for for Samsung, and it's why networks like Visa already settle on it.

Uh Solana provides the infrastructure for digital money, and Samsung provides the customer-facing experience, and to me, that's just the way it has to be. >> So, can the network handle this kind of scale? >> Solana is the leading network for a reason, and it handles vastly more scale than any other network today. Uh we already handle trillions of dollars of stablecoin transfers each year. >> Why does Samsung build with Solana? >> So, when we first design this service and experience, and we look at uh what um capability we need and uh what our users need. And then we realized that we need the infrastructure that has the uh fast uh settlement and then low cost for the transactions and

then uh also capacity to dealing with the growing use cases. So, there's no questions that the Solana is the strong fit for the purpose. >> So, cross-border transfers are also the starting point, right? But where else would you say stable coins could be useful in the way that people move and use money? >> So, I think that payment are another practical use cases, but especially for the um machine-to-machine or agent-to-agent uh transactions. So, those transactions will be uh little bit different from our ordinary transactions.

So, very uh frequent and then very small amount. So, we think that the kind of the transaction can um be dealt with a stablecoin most reliably and well. And then the other part is the we call it a unified uh modern financial services. So, what is most um more important than uh moving money is I need quality, not moving money. So, think about that. You have the checking account and the higher the saving account and then investment account. So, managing all those services

accounts means that sometimes you need to move money around them, but it is a real hassle. But I think that with the blockchain and the stablecoin technology, so we can actually providing some unified um experience. That means that uh without uh moving the money, you can actually manage it and then use uh those uh services um yeah, in that way. So, that is still one of the uh area we are looking at and then we think that that would have big uh difference in the future, I think.

>> And then same question to you. Cross-border transfers are the starting point, but where else could you see stable coins be useful in ways that people move and use money? >> Yeah, so we know stable coins are really useful for payments and transfers and things like that. Um but they're also useful for participating in frontier use cases. Um think about trading, uh think about DeFi, things like that. And I think the most important thing about stable coins is that they work the same way no matter where you are in the world. And uh that's um something really excited about.

>> Amazing. Well, thank you both. I think money that moves like everything else in your life is very much needed. Um and this is what it looks like. So, Won Suk, Maybo, thank you so much for taking the time.