The TUM Blockchain Conference 26 takes place from October 29 to 31, 2026 at the House of Communication in Munich. It is organized by the TUM Blockchain Club, the student club of the Technical University of Munich. This fourth edition lasts three days. Thus, the program includes a conference day, a Digital Assets Day with the Bundesblock and a Blockchain and AI hackathon.
Among the 113 speakers announced is Roman Thommen, co-founder and CTO of Qubic. He will give a keynote on October 29 at 1:35 p.m. on proof of work useful in production.
In brief
- Dates and location: October 29-31, 2026, House of Communication, Friedenstraße 24, Munich. A single ticket covers all three days.
- Previous edition: more than 1,200 participants and 125 speakers, according to the organizer. In 2026, 113 speakers are announced, with more to come.
- October 29: conference day on three stages (Nakamoto, Turing, Hopper). October 30: Digital Assets Day with the Bundesblock. October 30-31: Blockchain and AI hackathon, more than 4,000 euros in prize money announced.
- Roman Thommen, aka J0ET0M, co-founder and CTO of Qubic: keynote “Useful Proof of Work in Production: What Happens When Mining Has to Learn”, Thursday October 29, 1:35 p.m., Hopper stage.
What does the TUM Blockchain Conference 2026 offer?
This academic conference has changed scale. Indeed, launched by TUM students, it presents itself as the largest student blockchain conference in Germany. It also brought together more than 1,200 participants in 2025 (official website). In addition, the board crosses the same families of actors as our comparison of AI cryptos: cryptography researchers, protocol teams and traditional finance.
The 2026 program can be read over three separate days.
| Day | Format | What we find there |
| Thursday October 29 | TUM Blockchain Conference Day | Opening at 9 a.m. on the Nakamoto stage. Three scenes in parallel. Sessions on zero-knowledge proofs (“Plonk Without Random Oracles”, bug detection in ZK programs) and on the economics of AI agents. Keynote Qubic at 1:35 p.m. on the Hopper stage. |
| Friday October 30 | Digital Assets Day, with the Bundesblock | Opening at 8:45 a.m. Main Stage, Executive Forum and Future Stage. “From Digital Euro to Stablecoin Rails” (9:45 a.m.), AI x blockchain panels, then “Regulation, Tax & Competitiveness: MiCA 2.0, DAC8, DORA” (4:35 p.m.). |
| Friday October 30 to Saturday October 31 | Blockchain and AI Hackathon | Approximately 30 hours, open to all levels. On-site workshops and mentors. Endowment greater than 4,000 euros announced. Separate registration at hackathon.tum-blockchain.com. |
The list of speakers shows who the event is for. On the institutional side, Lewin Boehnke (Crypto Finance, Deutsche Börse group) and Christoph Hock (Union Investment) are announced. For her part, Franziska Huber represents the Bundesbank and the central bank digital currency. Alexander Höptner (AllUnity), Ramin Ghafari (Siemens) and Peter Busch (Bosch) are also there.
On the protocols and infrastructure side, Karim Jedda (Parity), Fabian Bormann (Cardano Foundation) and Paul Wong (Stellar Development Foundation) are on the program. Patricia Albrecht (Solana Germany) and Charles Moussy (Bybit) also join them. Finally, on the research side, Vadim Lyubashevsky (IBM Research Europe) is announced. He is also a figure in post-quantum cryptography. Several doctoral students from TU Wien, EPFL and Cambridge are also expected.
Who is Roman Thommen, the CTO of Qubic invited to the TUM Blockchain Conference?
Roman Thommen is announced by the organizer as co-founder and technical director of Qubic. He is also known in the Qubic community under the pseudonym J0ET0M.
A career as a computer scientist and teacher
A computer scientist by training, Roman Thommen is based in Switzerland. He boasts over twenty years of experience in technology. Software architect and project manager, he also founded several companies. Furthermore, Roman Thommen teaches at the vocational school and at the specialist college in Zug. Additionally, he has led media technology projects for radio, television and major sporting events. At Qubic, he works on the technical architecture of the network. He also speaks in English and German on decentralized AI and agent-driven transformation (Roman Thommen website).
Qubic milestones behind the keynote
His keynote is titled “Useful Proof of Work in Production: What Happens When Mining Has to Learn.” It can be translated as “proof of work useful in production: what happens when mining has to learn”. The subject is precise: Qubic makes its miners work on training neural networks rather than on disposable calculations. We had also detailed this principle in Qubic: transforming each CPU cycle into a real value. Since then, the project has moved from promises to deployments.
Thus, three milestones provide the material for the keynote. First, on July 29, Outsourced Computing moved to the main network. Third parties can now buy the computing power of miners.
Then, at epoch 228, at the end of August, mining Ant Colony has been activated. Instead of starting from scratch, miners extend the results published by others. Thus, the 676 best are rewarded each week (Qubic ticket from September 4).
Finally, on September 22, Qubic published a score of 0.38 for its model Neuraxon on ARC-AGI-3. This reasoning test is aimed at artificial intelligences. The model started from 0.13. Above all, this score was obtained on classic processors (Qubic report of September 22).
“When mining must learn” therefore describes this passage exactly. Indeed, network security is based on calculation which itself improves from one era to the next.
A niche against ZK cryptography
The niche is important. At 1:35 p.m. the same day, the Turing Stage hosts “Plonk Without Random Oracles,” a ZK cryptography session. The Munich public will therefore have to choose between zero-knowledge proofs and proof of useful work. These are two different answers to the same question: that of verifiable calculation.
How to attend the TUM Blockchain Conference?
The ticket office is hosted on Luma (luma.com/tbc26). Four categories are open:
- General Admission : the organizer specifies that it subsidizes student tickets.
- VIP : access to the speakers’ lounge, catering and reserved side events.
- Self-funded : for professionals who pay out of pocket, upon approval.
- Student : upon presentation of a student card.
Early bird sales are over. Additionally, prices are displayed in the ticket selector at the time of purchase. We do not reproduce them here, because they evolve in stages.
A ticket gives access to all three days. The hackathon, however, requires a separate registration. It is also explicitly aimed at beginners as well as experienced profiles.
For Qubic, Munich is a step in a European sequence that began in Paris in the spring. The project was already achieving this with its decentralized AI and its certified 15.5 million transactions per second. However, what the October 29 keynote will bring will be measured by a single yardstick: production figures, not a roadmap. Finally, we will publish a report after the session.
Thursday October 29, 2026 at 1:35 p.m., Hopper stage, House of Communication in Munich, in keynote. The timetable is that of the diary as of October 21. The organizer can adjust it.
No. The conference is open to everyone, without technical prerequisites according to the Technical University of Munich. The student rate is simply reserved for student card holders.
The ticket covers all three days, but the hackathon has its own registration at hackathon.tum-blockchain.com. It lasts around thirty hours, from October 30 to 31, with an announced prize of more than 4,000 euros.
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