MAM
Binance Smart Chain rebrands to BNB Chain
Mumbai: Binance Smart Chain (BSC), the community-driven, open-sourced and decentralised blockchain ecosystem has announced its rebranding to BNB chain. This move is to spotlight its connection with the BNB token, the decentralised evolution of the BNB ecosystem, and showcase how BNB has transcended Binance in terms of its use cases, said the statement.
With this name change, the brand aims to have more advancements to benefit users, projects and developers connected to the BNB Chain community.
BNB, which stands for ‘Build and Build’ (formerly called Binance Coin), is the blockchain gas token that ‘fuels’ transactions on BNB Chain. BNB also acts as a governance token, as it is necessary to participate in BNB Chain’s decentralised on-chain governance.
BNB Chain is comprised of BNB Beacon Chain (previously Binance Chain) and BNB Smart Chain (BSC) (Previously Binance Smart Chain).
“BNB Chain will embrace large-scale applications, including GameFi, SocialFi and the Metaverse,” said BNB Chain ecosystem coordinator Samy Karim. “In particular, scaling from one chain to multi-chain, improving scaling solutions and expanding the validator set of BSC from 21 to 41 (with 20 validators functioning as candidate block producers).”
Through MetaFi, the BNB Chain community will aim to build the infrastructure that powers the world’s parallel virtual ecosystem. (‘Meta’ for metadata, and ‘Fi’ for DeFi), is a concept that provides advanced and sophisticated DeFi infrastructure to all the different types of projects such as metaverse, GameFi, SocialFi, Web3, and NFTs and puts them under one umbrella – MetaFi.
MetaFi is a future all-encompassing ecosystem that promises to deliver a paradigm shift that will enable seamless interoperability between different projects and blockchains, according to the brand. The combination of these different blockchain projects enables a full-fledged parallel ecosystem serving users from around the globe.
Through the concept of MetaFi, BNB Chain aims to build the infrastructure to bring the parallel virtual ecosystem to life, it further said.
MAM
Time brings TIME100 Next franchise to India with Reliance
List to spotlight 100 emerging leaders, gala set for December 2026 in Mumbai.
MUMBAI: It’s about time India’s next wave got a global spotlight and now, it’s on the list. New York-headquartered Time is expanding its TIME100 Next franchise to India, partnering with Reliance Industries Limited to launch TIME100 Next India, its first international extension of the rising leaders platform. The announcement was made at the Time100 Gala in New York by Jessica Sibley and Nita Mukesh Ambani, signalling a strategic push to tap into India’s growing influence across sectors.
The India edition will recognise 100 emerging leaders from the country and the global Indian diaspora, spanning business, science, sports, arts and social impact. The list will be curated by Time’s editorial team and published online, continuing the franchise’s focus on identifying individuals shaping the future.
The initiative will culminate in a gala event scheduled for December 2026 at the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre, anchoring the platform within India’s cultural and business ecosystem.
TIME’s broader Time100 franchise has steadily expanded its global footprint since 2021 through events and impact-led initiatives. Executives noted that India’s growing pool of influential voices and innovators made it a natural next step for the platform’s international ambitions.
For Reliance, the partnership aligns with its broader push to support emerging talent and ideas on a global stage. For Time, it marks a timely bet on India not just as a market, but as a talent engine shaping the next chapter of global leadership.
