Training talents for the era of stablecoins and agentic AI. A one-day Calgary forum convening the practitioners, founders, and researchers charting what comes next at the edge of finance and AI.
RSVP for July 28 →Practitioners working at the edge of stablecoins, payments, and agentic AI, in the room to co-design the program.
VP & Head, Business Solutions & Digital Assets
ATB Financial
Brian leads ATB Business Solutions, overseeing payments, liquidity, trade finance, cards, and cryptocurrency. He previously held senior cash-management and payments roles at HSBC across Canada and Korea.
Co-Founder
Loon
Kevin is building Loon, a regulated Canadian-dollar stablecoin. Previously the technical architect behind Paytrie and a senior blockchain architect at ConsenSys, he holds a systems design engineering degree from the University of Waterloo.
Founder & CEO
BrightOnLABS
Youssef founded BrightOnLABS, building AI-driven SaaS for anomaly detection and cloud security. A DevSecOps and cybersecurity specialist, he holds a Master's in Cybersecurity Engineering with a focus on AI.
Marketing Director
Blockchain Insurance Inc.
A Calgary entrepreneur with more than 25 years of experience and an active angel investor across 30+ startups, Jade advises founders through Innovate Calgary and hosts the weekly show "Telling It Like It Is."
Executive Director
Canadian Blockchain Consortium
Koleya leads the Canadian Blockchain Consortium, the country's largest blockchain ecosystem organization, uniting companies, corporate leaders, and government. A cleantech entrepreneur and CEO of Absolute Combustion, she co-founded the Canadian Blockchain Association for Women.
Cybersecurity Team Lead & AI Champion
Videotron
Julie is a cybersecurity professional with 14 years defending critical infrastructure across energy, banking, telecom, and manufacturing, with expertise in red teaming, adversarial testing, and securing generative AI. She focuses on the intersection of AI security and governance, and speaks frequently at conferences including InCyber, GoSec, and HackMiami.
CADD Program Director
Tetra Digital Group
Felipe leads the CADD program at Tetra Digital Group, which launched CADD, Canada's first Canadian-dollar-backed stablecoin issued by a financial institution and approved by Alberta Treasury Board and Finance. He has been the program's lead voice on driving stablecoin adoption through business-to-business payments.
Legal Counsel
Alberta Securities Commission
Mohamed co-leads the ASC's work on fiat-backed stablecoins and is deeply involved in the CSA's efforts in this area, including the development and implementation of the Canadian regulatory framework for stablecoins. His work sits at the intersection of regulation, payments, digital assets, and financial market innovation. He is also active in the CSA's AI initiatives, including recent staff guidance, consultations, and broader policy on the use of AI in capital markets.
Professor of AI
School of Information, University of Michigan
Jiayu Zhou is a Professor of AI at the University of Michigan School of Information, researching machine learning and its applications, including large-scale optimization, federated learning, and AI for health.
Associate Professor, Schulich School of Engineering
University of Calgary
Dr. Drew's research spans distributed systems, privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs), and blockchain. He was a final winner of the NSF/NIST Privacy-Enhancing Technologies Challenges. He received the Best Paper Award at the 2025 IEEE International Conference on Autonomous and Trusted Computing.
Associate Professor of Finance · Canada Research Chair in Financial Technology
Haskayne School of Business, University of Calgary
Marius Zoican is an Associate Professor of Finance and Canada Research Chair in Financial Technology at the Haskayne School of Business, University of Calgary, researching market microstructure, decentralized finance, and the economics of financial technology.
The full-day schedule for Tuesday, July 28, 2026 in the Indigo Room at the Alt Hotel, University District.
Anders Nygren and Henry Leung · Schulich School of Engineering, University of Calgary
Brian Ford · VP & Head, Business Solutions & Digital Assets, ATB Financial
Kevin Zhang · Co-Founder, Loon
Felipe Priuli · CADD Program Director, Tetra Digital Group
Mohamed Zohiri, LL.B, LL.M · Legal Counsel, Alberta Securities Commission
Koleya Karringten · Executive Director, Canadian Blockchain Consortium
Kevin Zhang, Brian Ford, Felipe Priuli, and Mohamed Zohiri · Moderated by Jade Alberts, Marketing Director, Blockchain Insurance Inc.
Youssef Harkati · Founder & CEO, BrightOnLABS
Marius Zoican · Associate Professor of Finance, Haskayne School of Business, University of Calgary
Jiayu Zhou · Professor of AI, School of Information, University of Michigan
Steve Drew · Schulich School of Engineering, University of Calgary
Julie Brunias · Cybersecurity Team Lead & AI Champion, Videotron
Youssef Harkati, Marius Zoican, Jiayu Zhou, and Steve Drew · Moderated by Henry Leung
Organizing Committee
Professor, Schulich School of Engineering
University of Calgary
Dr. Leung's research spans AI, data analytics, the Internet of Things, machine learning, robotics, and signal and image processing. He is a Fellow of IEEE, SPIE, the Canadian Academy of Engineering, and the Royal Society of Canada. He is a recipient of the 2024 Killam Research Excellence Award.
Associate Professor, Schulich School of Engineering
University of Calgary
Dr. Drew's research spans distributed systems, privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs), and blockchain. He was a final winner of the NSF/NIST Privacy-Enhancing Technologies Challenges. He received the Best Paper Award at the 2025 IEEE International Conference on Autonomous and Trusted Computing.
We would like to thank IEEE's Systems, Man, and Cybernetics Society, ATB Financial, and the University of Calgary's Schulich School of Engineering for sponsoring this event.
A question we want to work through together, connecting Alberta's fintech employers with the next generation of engineering talent.
Stablecoins are quietly rewriting payments, and agentic AI is rewriting how work gets done. Canada has no curriculum for the engineers, researchers, and operators who will have to ship at that intersection, so this day is where we draft it.