Cardano Expands Global Presence With New Integrations And Academic Partnership

• Cardano expands staking, tokenization, and listings across Europe and Latin America.
• PUC-Rio and Cardano partner to research blockchain in energy and financial sectors.
• Kraken lists Cardano’s snek token, signaling growing institutional interest in CNTs.

The Cardano Foundation is expanding its global initiatives through network expansions and a newly announced academic collaboration to advance blockchain research and practical applications. In April 2025, the Foundation unveiled multiple integrations across Europe and Latin America, expanding Cardano’s reach in both the financial and academic sectors.

April saw several new integrations highlighting the growing adoption of Cardano’s native assets and staking features. A regulated exchange based in Liechtenstein now hosts a dedicated Cardano ecosystem page. This new section features a range of Cardano-native tokens and associated projects, offering users in European markets increased visibility into the blockchain’s ecosystem.

In France, Meria Finance introduced on-chain ADA staking on its financial platform. This development extends staking access to a broader financial audience and represents Meria’s first Cardano-related integration since its entry into the crypto market in 2017.

Meanwhile, the process of tokenizing assets on the Cardano blockchain progressed as Tiamonds, an LCX project, launched a silver-backed token. This means every token can be used for one gram of silver and uses Cardano smart contracts for safe management and ownership verification. This move makes Cardano’s decentralized ecosystem a real-world asset.

Another notable development was the listing of snek, a Cardano Native Token (CNT), on Kraken. As a tier-one exchange, Kraken’s inclusion of a CNT points to growing institutional recognition of Cardano’s token standard and overall ecosystem maturity.

Research Partnership With Brazilian University Announced

A research cooperation between the Cardano Foundation and the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio), established in Latin America, was the only leading academic institution in the region. The Areas covered by the partnership are the areas they invest in, such as blockchain technology used in industries like finance, digital assets, decentralized autonomous organisations (DAOs), and blockchain economics.

The collaboration includes cooperation with Petrobras, Brazil’s state-owned oil company, to research blockchain-based energy production and consumption solutions. The project aims to explore applications in renewable energy and improve transparency, efficiency, and security in the sector.

PUC-Rio’s Ledger Labs will be the pivotal partner. As part of the initiative, the Cardano Foundation will support the development of Ada Labs for Blockchain Applications (A.L.B.A.), a laboratory modelled after a similar initiative in Argentina. The labs will be the center of joint research and technical experimentation activities and blockchain-oriented educational courses.

The partnership will also help to promote public engagement through joint activities, collaborative research, and community development projects. Such activities link academia to real-world use cases for blockchain and foster cross-sector knowledge sharing.