Top 5 Announcements From Solana Accelerate Hong Kong

Just two months after closing down the biggest ever Solana Breakpoint in Abu Dhabi, Solana Accelerate has kicked off the 2026 conference calendar with a bang in Hong Kong.

Welcoming attendees from across the sector, Solana Accelerate set the stage for Internet Capital Markets in APAC. Highlighting the region’s builders and thought leaders, Solana Accelerate coincided with the Consensys Hong Kong event, uniting the crypto community in one of the world’s greatest historic trade centers.

Encompassing everyone from the hoodied degens and developers to the suited hedge fund managers and venture capitalists, Solana Accelerate delivered a slew of announcements and insightful panels on the network’s direction for the year ahead.

Solana Accelerate Hong Kong Recap

From infrastructural improvements to new DeFi tools and retail-facing products, Solana Accelerate had a bit of everything. Here’s a breakdown of some of the biggest announcements from the event:

1. Alibaba Demos High-Performance Solana RPCs

Alibaba, the world’s largest ecommerce company, provided more clarity on its foray into the Solana infrastructure stack. 

Presented by Zhao Qingyuan, Alibaba Cloud Intelligence Group demoed its high-performance Solana RPCs, which the firm claims can confirm transactions within 2 slots, with a 99.99% success rate.

While Solana already boasts a comprehensive suite of RPC providers, Alibaba Cloud’s development in this area signals the growing interest that the world’s largest companies are taking in the network.

2. Solflare Card Enables Real-World Payments Using Any SPL Token

Crypto debit cards might be commonplace, but teams like Solflare are pushing retail crypto use to new frontiers. Speaking at Solana Accelerate, Payments Lead Mihaljo Miklos unveiled that the Solflare card now enables users to spend any SPL asset on real-world purchases.

The feature operates on a priority system, meaning that users can set a preference on which tokens are used for real-world payments first. If a balance is empty, the card automatically uses the next asset in the user’s list of authorized tokens.

3. Anza Sheds Light on Alpenglow

Slated to bring transaction finality below 150ms, Alpenglow is currently the biggest network update coming to Solana in 2026. Anza Developer Relations Lead Brian Wong took the stage to provide an update on progress, suggesting that the Alpenglow is expected to go live on mainnet in early Q3 2026.

According to Anza’s internal testing, transaction finality under Alpenglow is being measured at ~120ms. Beyond improving chain speeds, Alpenglow is expected to move network consensus offchain, which will help to reduce the overhead costs of validator operation.

4. Kamino, Anchorage, and The Solana Company to Collateralize Offchain assets

Kamino continues its push to bring tradfi capital into DeFi. In collaboration with The Solana Company, a DAT backed by Pantera Capital, and Anchorage, a custodian, Kamino has launched a pilot program to enable firms to borrow onchain assets against offchain collateral.

 

Through an API, the product emits a mirror token that represents the value of the collateral locked in the smart vault. Kamino Foundation’s Cheryl Chan posited that the mirror token can then be used to borrow stablecoins on Solana, which can be deployed elsewhere in the ecosystem in search of yield.

5. Drift Teases Perps Markets for Equities

Aligning with a wider shift towards merging DeFi and TradFi, Drift Protocol Head of Product Kevin Eum teased future asset listings on Solana’s OG perpetual trading venue. After announcing that Drift intends to support RWA collateralization, Eum also hinted that equity perps would be deploying on the application in the near future.

While an expanding range of listed assets on Drift is a great step towards adoption, Drift is far from the first venue to offer leveraged equities trading. In collaboration with Remora Markets, Flash Trade launched perps markets for a select range of tokenized stocks in December 2025.

With Solana Accelerate Hong Kong closing its doors, the Solana Foundation topped of the event by announcing a flash sale on tickets to its landmark event, Solana Breakpoint, scheduled to take place in London this November.

The next Solana Accelerate event will be held in Miami on May 5.

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