6 Ways To Leverage Blockchain Without Becoming A Completely Decentralized Organization
Cory Hymel
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June 13, 2022
Enterprises are becoming more aware and interested in Web3 and blockchain technology. Many industry experts believe that this technology will completely change how companies do business and organizations are feeling the pressure to adapt. Looking at this landscape of evolving technology and the way we use the internet, it’s no surprise that enterprises wanting to explore blockchain will feel overwhelmed. Many organizations are worried that adopting this new tech requires completely turning 180 degrees from their current operations and technologies.
But this doesn’t have to be the case. While there are benefits to fully preparing your organization for Web3, you can still adopt blockchain in small ways to help bring efficiency in a specific task, area of business, goal, or project.
Forget about the big-scale and grand missions to venture into virtual worlds. Here are some of the ways organizations and enterprises can leverage blockchain technology without making major organizational changes.
Some restaurants have accepted crypto payment, particularly Bitcoin, as a new form of payment method for nearly ten years. This proves it doesn’t take a major tech investment to accept crypto payments. The rest of the biggest cryptocurrencies in the world, such as Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum and Litecoin, have also followed suit, and they are now accepted as payment modes. Organizations can solely adopt cryptocurrency as a new payment method.
Companies can have a virtual wallet for their crypto and do not need to transform their entire operations. Some of the major companies that have already adopted this new form of payment include Microsoft, PayPal, Starbucks, Whole Foods, Home Depot, and many others.
Some of the benefits that enterprises seek from blockchain technology include the provenance of company data and records, as well as strong identity and privacy systems. Being a decentralized distributed ledger, the blockchain can provide data cloud storage that is transparent, and secure, and enables easy viewing and tracking of even the earliest records of the company. The blockchain system itself also provides security through encryption and verification, which enables users to retain control of their identity.
One example is the storing of health data records and information on the blockchain. Once stored on the ledger, it will be viewable but also secured and immutable. It cannot be hacked. Any changes to the records or data can be applied again on another block to be verified by the system.
This is one of the most common use of blockchain technology – to augment enterprises’ marketing and advertising efforts. Companies are using the blockchain technology to launch metaverses of their own, build virtual stores, and create their own NFTs, among others. These are some of the new revolutionary ways enterprises can further their advertising and marketing. The use of blockchain tech can be solely for this goal, and ultimately attract younger markets who are well versed in today’s tech and internet.
If your organization deals with a lot of original works that have intellectual property (IP) rights such as patents, copyrights, trademarks and others, tokenization of these unique pieces of work may benefit you greatly. NFTs are basically virtual versions of an IP title. In a form of a unique token, NFT represents ownership of digital media or documents such as art, photos, audio clips, videos, animated graphics, manuscripts and so on.
The art community uses tokenization wisely by creating a virtual duplicate of their original artworks and minting them into NFTs. The NFTs may represent the IP rights of the original creation or invention, which means that whoever buys the virtual token will hold the IP of their art. In most cases, trading the IP in NFT form will include the physical version of the art delivered to the buyer. By using NFTs, organizations or IP holders are free to trade original works and inventions easily and directly.
By having a hassle-free buying or selling of IP and their physical original works, it will bring efficiency to an enterprise’s trading operations.
Smart contracts are simply codes that are programmed into the blockchain to execute action if certain conditions are met. It is a virtual contract in action. When Company A does work for Company B, and all of the agreed-upon conditions are met, the programmed smart contract will then autonomously execute Company B’s payment to Company A as the work is done.
Home Depot currently uses smart contracts to create more transparency and trust with suppliers. If there is a dispute with a vendor, they can easily run through relevant smart contracts in real time to identify any issues.
Organizations and enterprises can take advantage of the automation that comes with smart contracts. It eliminates middlemen, discrepancies, fraudulent activities, and delays as it accurately and efficiently carries out menial tasks and functions according to a set of rules embedded in the codes.
Companies working on a specific task or goal or forming a foundation for a cause can make use of a DAO or Decentralized Autonomous Organization. DAO can be a new type of organizational structure for a company’s dedicated team of like-minded people to work on one specific goal. The DAO can be time-limited, or it can last forever. But essentially, DAOs are the ideal structure for nimble small groups or teams that would, for example, raise funds and work on providing support for causes that they believe in.
It can be applied as an organizational structure for a new foundation, giving every member of the organization the right to vote and offer inputs for the success of the organization’s cause. Companies do not need to completely transform their operations into a decentralized one. Based on their focus, plans and goals, they only need to adopt blockchain technology into some parts of their operations. Gigster has helped a number of companies in their first projects going into Web3 using blockchain technology.
Gigster has talented managed teams specializing in Web3. They can guide and support an enterprise to bring their Web3 project to life, as well as educate a company’s teams and equip them with skills needed for their Web3 and blockchain venture. Feeling overwhelmed with blockchain? It’s time to consult Gigster and learn how blockchain technology can bring immense value to your company and your specific industry.