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Blockchain’s Journey To The Mainstream Not Much Unlike The Internet’s

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dan peter
Blockchain’s Journey To The Mainstream Not Much Unlike The Internet’s

According to the advisory and research heavyweight Gartner, the revolution that is blockchain’s promise will unfold in approximately five to ten years. Gartner’s Senior Director Analyst Fabio Chesini commented that the trend now being seen with blockchain is very similar to the proliferation and development of the internet. 

There is an ongoing power shift, prompted by the utilization of blockchain. This power shift can be understood by taking a look at the evolution that is happening within the financial services industry. If the trend and pattern we saw with the internet democratized information exchange, the trend we are seeing within blockchain democratizes liquidity and value exchange. 

When viewed in context, cryptocurrencies and public blockchains are facilitating exponential growth on how groups and individuals carry out value exchange. The internet unbundled and intermediated various services. Marketing is an example of such a service. This pattern of unbundling and reintermediation is also predicted to occur with value exchange, which ultimately unbundles reintermediation even further.

The following timeline is projected in blockchain’s journey towards the mainstream:

  • 2019: Blockchain proponents face disillusionment, as implementations disappoint while experimentation is the “best” position of blockchain projects. This disillusionment leads to reduced interest in the tech and in markets. The technology has failed to live up to the hype so far, and a vast majority of corporate blockchain projects are in experimentation mode. 
  • 2021: The tech progress and practical use cases assisted by blockchain are consistent, this pushes the market in its way out of the trough witnessed in 2019
  • 2023: Scalability and interoperability become a reality within blockchain platforms. Smart contract portability, cross-chain functionality, and trusted private transactions are widely supported. Permissioned and public blockchains gradually start integrating. This progression in tech will take the industry closer to mainstream blockchain and web 3.0.
  • 2028: The revolution promised by blockchain becomes reality. This revolution is predicted across business ecosystems.

There are a few additional considerations for blockchain to go mainstream. According to Gartner, they can’t merely bank on users to possess sufficient tech knowledge to opt for the best parts of a blockchain for themselves. The problem of interoperability between the several disparate blockchain platforms must be resolved. Last month, Gartner cautioned that interoperability issues and other factors might obstruct fin companies hopeful of deploying blockchain solutions over the coming years.

Chesini mentioned four critical interconnected hassles to the financial services industries which were presented in his report: the first two were with regards to governance, and the second two were interoperability and integration related. 

  1. There is a need to fully understand the ongoing power shift.
  2. There is a lack of maturity within governance: both within public blockchains and when these types of governance models are contextualized within fin services.
  3. Fragmentation in standards: Each blockchain is attempting to superimpose it’s de-facto standard; the future is expected to come with a mass consolidation among standards.
  4. Marketing choices: There are particular defacto standards now, however, a subset of the standards being consolidated can be expected in the future.
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