On January 6, 2026 in Cape Town, QIE Blockchain announced that its validator program is now open to new participants, coinciding with the project's listing on the MEXC exchange. The network reported over 4,000 teams joining its first global developer conference and hackathon, resulting in 180 dApps on the QIE mainnet, while validators share 50,000 QIE in monthly rewards that halve every two years alongside a gas fee burn mechanism.