Blockchain has become one of the buzzwords nowadays. Although many people still associate it with Bitcoin, blockchain technology is much more than that. It can be utilized not only in finance and banking but also in medicine, healthcare, government regulation, and other areas.
Blockchain has been facing many barriers on its way to adoption. However, now it’s more welcomed in the business environment. This technology helps companies to achieve increased security, enhanced transparency, and a high level of efficiency. In this article, we will look into what blockchain is and what benefits it can offer to your business.
What is Blockchain?
It may be difficult to grasp the concept of blockchain technology at first. However, it’s a type of highly-secure database. The main difference between traditional databases such as SQL and blockchain is the way of storing information.
Blockchain collects information into “blocks” and when one block is full it’s connected to the “chain” forming the blockchain itself. In contrast to usual databases, blockchain is not managed by a specific person, it’s controlled by everyone who uses it. This feature makes blockchain highly secure and almost impossible to be hacked.
How Blockchain Can Power Up Your Business
Blockchain is a revolutionary technology that can open new horizons for your business. It offers innovative solutions for the improved company’s performance, thus, increasing customer satisfaction and leading your business to the top of the market competition.
Here are the key features of blockchain that will help your business to achieve new goals:
- Due to the decentralized nature and distributed ledger technology blockchain data management is more transparent, consistent, and secure. All the documents and transaction records can be viewed by everyone who uses the system. Moreover, it’s almost impossible to change any locked data, thus, it’s easy to trace any activities within the blockchain database.
- The reason for blockchain’s increased security lies in its data management approach. After being accepted, every new transaction is encrypted and then connected to the previous block forming the chain. Being a decentralized system, blockchain provides companies with high protection from hacker attacks as there is no center to aim at.
- Tracing products becomes easy since blockchain makes records of any transactions and it’s impossible to change any data in the locked block. Blockchain traceability can benefit many spheres, however, for now, it is mostly used in supply chain management to trace the origin and quality of goods.
- There is no one and at the same time, everyone is in charge of the blockchain transactions. Everyone has the same accessibility which makes the relationships among users more trustworthy. Blockchain users don’t spend time collaborating with intermediaries trying to check the reliability of the counterpart.
- Cost-efficiency. In addition to the previous point, blockchain also helps to reduce expenses on the mediators as there is no need to ensure the safety of the operations.
Where to Use Blockchain?
According to the research made by Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance, blockchain technology is mostly used in banking and financial software development.
However, they’re much more business applications of blockchain such as:
- Stock trading. Due to its decentralized and distributed nature, blockchain can ensure fast and secure stock trading on the market. In contrast to the several days necessary for the trading processes to be executed, blockchain allows doing everything within a couple of minutes.
- Smart contracts. Blockchain may be a great solution for companies struggling to manage multiple transactions. Automatic validation of smart contracts helps to increase transaction speed and improve business efficiency.
- Supply chain management. Blockchain can be used by supply chain companies to replace slow manual activities with innovative methods to process large amounts of information. Moreover, due to its high level of traceability, blockchain helps companies to meet growing customer demands by providing proven information about the provenance of the goods, their quality, etc.
- Blockchain decentralized nature and its robust security features reduce the likelihood of errors making it particularly useful for audit and accounting.
- Blockchain technology can be used to store any kind of personal data (gender, age, vaccination history) necessary for a healthcare organization’s statistics. Moreover, all of this information will stay confidential due to the core features of blockchain processes such as transparency, traceability, and safety.
- Logistics. In logistics, blockchain technology can be used through smart contracts to accelerate and secure transaction processes. What is more, information received through the blockchain network is much more complete and credible which is crucial when dealing with food products or medicines.
Blockchain-as-a-Service
Blockchain complexity interferes with its general adoption. It’s rather difficult to install and manage. However, Blockchain-as-a-Service (BaaS) can become an effective solution.
There are so-called BaaS providers that take responsibility for developing and handling blockchain for the customers.
As a result, organizations across different spheres can benefit from the blockchain without spending time and extra resources on its integration into their structure. By using blockchain development services companies can concentrate on their main activities and use blockchain solutions to enhance their efficiency.
Final Words
Blockchain potential is still undervalued. Apart from finance and cryptocurrencies, they can be used in many spheres such as audit, accounting, retailing, the public sector, and many others. Not only can blockchain adoption improve the security and transparency issues of the company but also increase its efficiency and cut costs.
The market is following the demands of the clients. Thus, as soon as customers gain confidence in this technology and decide that products and services with the use of blockchain are more convenient and consistent, the market will come after them.
Although nowadays it’s not obligatory to integrate blockchain technology, it’s crucial to be aware of its aspects to stand tall among competitors in the future.
