Solana Foundation Targets Institutional Growth With New Executive Hires

Conlan assumes responsibility for institutional partnerships and go-to-market strategy, tasked with guiding businesses through the transition from pilot programs to full-scale implementation. Her background includes senior marketing and strategy roles at Binance, OKX, and CAA Sports. Meanwhile, Raees shifts focus to payment firms and enterprises, leveraging his experience at Polygon Labs and infrastructure companies like Bridge and Wyre to expand Solana’s footprint in global payment processing.

These appointments arrive as Solana solidifies its role in the "Token Supercycle," a framework the foundation uses to describe the migration of real-world assets and traditional finance onto blockchain rails. With real-world asset volume surpassing $4.5 billion and tokenized equity supply exceeding $620 million, the network has attracted major players including BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, and SBI Global Asset Management. The foundation has also aggressively pursued payment-specific integrations, ranging from merchant payment trials with South Korean processor KSNet to AI-agent payment gateways developed alongside Google Cloud.