Many participants in industry hackathons are just looking to earn some quick prize money and move on to the next competition – Dominic Kwok calls them “Bounty Hunters.”

But Easya, start-up for developers that he and his brother Phil started four years ago, looking for another type of competitor demes that want to build companies that can have a significant impact on web3. It is an approach that has proven to be fruitful, with companies coming out of Easya’s app community and monthly personal hackathons that have raised money for a collective valuation of over $ 3 billion from top VC companies such as A16Z Crypto and CMT Digital. And Easya’s mobile app, which helps developers to easily start building their own web3 projects, have over a million users around the world.

At the first Easya Consensus Hackathon in Austin last May, more than 700 participants launched 100 different crypto projects, and Kwoks expect similar numbers for upcoming events at Consensus Hong Kong and Consensus Toronto (if you would like to apply for Easya Hackathon at Consensus Hong King 2025 you have to go here).

Here they discuss why their unique approach to Hackathons, how they expect consensus Hong Kong to deviate from hackathons in other parts of the world and how Donald Trump’s choices can affect the types of projects that crypto developers focus on.

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This interview has been condensed and easily edited for clarity.

How did Easya get started?

Dominic: So we initially launched Easya about four years ago as the speed to place for everyone to learn about the world’s best blockchains. Anyone can use the Easya app on iOS and Android to learn about the top layers out there, such as Solana, Polkadot, Stellar and Ripple’s XRP Ledger. And people can learn to not only develop but also launch their own projects. We also host a lot of big Hackathons personally all over the world, where hundreds of people come personally and launch projects on our blockchain partners. And the goal is to get these people not only launched, but then also the founding and building of startups that continue to be funded by the ecosystem and VCs.

How are you approaching Hackathons differently from other companies that drive these?

Dominic: Two things. The first is that Easya is very focused on founders who want to start their own businesses against Hackathon “Bounty Hunters.” We really want to make sure that our participants actually stay around and build their projects because this is where we see the future of web3 that is really built from. And the other thing is most of our hackathons are a single chain, so the participants focus on a piece of tech, and they actually launch on one, as opposed to focusing on 50 different chains. We want to put people in front of the best ecosystems that have the most support for developers.

How do you think that consensushackathon in Hong Kong will be different from those you have in other parts of the world?

Dominic: The scale just gets super big. We have already had a record number of people applying for the seats at the arena. Of course, we want people from Hong Kong, but then also from other Asian countries such as India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore and China. And we also see a large number of people from the West will come. For many of these people it will be the first time they have actually been in Asia.

Do you expect there are differences in the types of projects that developers in Asia are pursuing, unlike those in other parts of the world?

Phil: There is a geographical element and then there is also a thematic element. A huge theme that we have seen comes up in the last few weeks is AI X Web3, and many developers are excited about this intersection. We have also seen protocols that virtual really start and become very successful, so I think we will see a lot of it. Geographically, in Asia, there are so many different currencies in Asia, and we see that developers who actually understand these cross -border use cases much better. If you are an American-based developer, you do not necessarily see these friction points a ton. So I think we will see much more of the cross -border payment solutions starting to quench themselves.

How do you think Donald Trump’s presidency will affect the kind of projects you look at your hackathons?

Phil: Of course, Defi has always been one of the largest areas of the product market that suits crypto – without a doubt one of the few who actually has that fit. But so far because of honestly how scared many developers were in the states, many people just were not built or launched in the US, and then you would often move on to a decentral app, and that is, “oh, you’re in the states you cannot use this. ” So it is a very visible area where we start to see changes. Another area where you cannot participate if you come from the US is AirDrops. So if you are an end user, you couldn’t really access a lot of crypto. And if you wanted to target this demographic, which is of course the richest in the world, you couldn’t. So I think Defi will really explode, especially in the US.

Both of you are also speakers at Consensus Hong Kong. What do you want to talk about?

Dominic: Our keynote speaker is about why it is so difficult right now for web3 ecosystems to attract developers now. And we give some of our tips on how to more easily attract developers and on a larger scale. Right now, web3 companies are competing for the same developers and the growth of web3 devs has largely stagnated. And obviously at Easya, our entire mission is to actually bring more developers into space. It starts with making it easy. But we also do more Big Tech upgrades that allow developers to build much easier on-chain. And we reveal them on stage.