Bitcoin in the creation and use of money, but its fate will be largely be affected by the actions of centralized corporate third parties. eliminates the role of a single central authority I’ve reviewed how some of the world’s largest companies integrating blockchains into their operations and thinking about the technology to provide a starting point for assessing the role they might play in driving the adoption of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. Square/CashApp, Twitter Jack Dorsey, co-founder/CEO of Twitter and Square, has been following Bitcoin since the whitepaper was published and has recently become quite active in the cryptocurrency space both professionally and personally. Square enabled the through its mobile payment service CashApp in January 2018. They sold , netting them a small profit of about $1 million. Dorsey about how he came to understand Bitcoin, why he believes the Internet and society need a native, open, digital currency, and new business models that are enabled by cryptocurrency. buying, selling, and holding of Bitcoin $166 million worth of Bitcoin over the course of the year recently spoke at length When asked about the possibility of integrating payments into Twitter, he replied: Lightning Network “ I think there’s a lot there, and it’s really compelling and something that we want to spend a lot more time on…we finally have technologies, more broadly at the blockchain level that I think can help us address some of the challenges we’re facing with Twitter including trust and identity, and certainly providing more economic incentive rather than just what Twitter provides today which is reach. It is a pretty active conversation within the company and around the company, and we want to be smart about it and make sure that again, we’re building something that feels really simple and accessible and is timed in the right way. But it’s definitely something that I would be excited about and would love to see.”( ) 36:28 Dorsey has , is using , , and has been in anticipation of mass adoption. He also tweeted about his purchases of a plug-and-play and a . invested in Lightning Labs accepting Bitcoin tips on Twitter tippin.me held Bitcoin’s Lightning torch purchasing $10,000 worth of Bitcoin per week full Bitcoin/Lightning node Trezor hardware wallet Starbucks Starbucks, along with Microsoft and the Boston Consulting group, , a startup that aims to facilitate adoption of cryptocurrencies for the world’s largest financial institutions. is owned by , the owner of the New York Stock Exchange is backing Bakkt Bakkt ICE In exchange for a generous portion of equity, which instantly converts cryptocurrency into dollars. Consumers will be able to “spend” their bitcoin at Starbucks, but the company’s final books will remain clear of cryptocurrencies. Starbucks will allow consumers to pay-in store with bitcoin using Bakkt’s software Kroger Kroger, the United States’ second largest grocer by revenue, has due to excessive fees charged by the payment processor. Shortly after the announcement was made, Anthony Pompliano to have the team from Morgan Creek Digital fly out to help them integrate Bitcoin’s Lightning Network as a payment option. abandoned Visa credit cards in over 200 stores tweeted an offer A , moving the conversation to direct messages to set up a meeting with the company’s Chief Digital officer. product manager at Kroger Digital quickly responded Samsung After dismissing early reports as “ ”, Samsung announced that their flagship that supports Ethereum and select decentralized applications. Previous reports indicated that Bitcoin would be supported, but for the initial version of the Samsung Blockchain Wallet. rumor and speculation Galaxy S10 would include a built in cryptocurrency wallet this isn’t the case Fidelity Fidelity Investments is one of the world’s largest asset managers, responsible for over $2 trillion in assets. They’ve built and are currently testing “ institutional investors” that want to invest in Bitcoin and other digital assets. The company started and recently Coin Metrics. enterprise-grade custody and execution services for mining Bitcoin and Ether in 2017 invested in blockchain analytics startup J.P. Morgan While Jamie Dimon has been making headlines for , his company has been working to develop blockchain-based products. J.P. Morgan was a founding member of the that launched in early 2017 and has developed a , that allows users to easily deploy permissioned blockchains. disparaging Bitcoin as a dangerous fraud Enterprise Ethereum Alliance fork of the public Ethereum blockchain, Quorom They’ve , a private stablecoin backed by the U.S. dollar that is being tested for business-to-business payments in a small pilot group. one day JPMcoin could be used for consumer payments. recently announced JPM Coin Dimon believes that The company is also . This work could be used to allow clients to make use of public blockchains without giving up sensitive business data. Binance’s research group published a , and a former VP & Blockchain Strategy lead at JPM contributing to research focused on applying zero-knowledge proofs to blockchain technology comprehensive analysis of JPM coin discussed his thoughts in a Twitter thread. Facebook In early 2018, that he would start studying cryptocurrency because it can “take power from centralized systems and put it back into people’s hands”. A few months later Facebook and they’ve recently . Facebook’s to other company employees and is being led by former PayPal president David Marcus. Mark Zuckerberg announced launched a blockchain division acquired a blockchain startup internal crypto team reportedly “works in an office off-limits” Now, Facebook is that WhatsApp users will be able to send to friends and family instantly. They’re in talks with exchanges about listing the coin which may be pegged to a basket of foreign currencies. Zuckerberg also recently . developing a cryptocurrency discussed the pros and cons of replacing Facebook Connect with a distributed blockchain-based service for logins Google Google’s failure “ to be on the bleeding edge” of blockchain technology. Now, the company is making up for lost time. They’re for public blockchains and working on .” They’ve to provide rapid-deployment Sergey Brin lamented developing blockchain search tools their own “distributed digital ledger partnered with BlockApps blockchain solutions for the Google Cloud Platform. Amazon allows users to easily deploy private blockchains hosted on AWS using Hyperledger Fabric or Ethereum. The company is working with Mastercard and Accenture to . Amazon’s Managed Blockchain service establish transparent “circular” supply chains Microsoft and has partnered with XYO to provide They also for topping up their accounts to make purchases in the Windows and Xbox stores. Microsoft has developed its own blockchain management solution for its Azure cloud platform blockchain-based geospatial apps on the Azure marketplace. allow customers to use Bitcoin The company is working on blockchain-based that it believes can play an important role in . They’re . standards for decentralized digital identities defending human rights across the globe working with Spain’s largest telecom company to explore opportunities in blockchain technology Reddit Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian was an early investor in Coinbase and in the potential for cryptocurrencies to transform the world. He believes the current “crypto winter” that has seen prices plunge by 80–90% from all-time highs has caused speculators to flee and will allow the technology enthusiasts to focus on “ .” is a true believer building the infrastructure that it’s going to take to really make this happen Reddit , “Reddit Notes”, in 2015. Former CEO Yishan Wong was excited about the idea of trying to using blockchain technology. briefly experimented with creating their own cryptocurrency “decentralize the company” IBM for food trust, identity, and trade finance. Their Blockchain facilitates cross-border payments that clear and settle in seconds using the Stellar network. Ethereum-based cloud computing platform iExec has integrated IBM Cloud to . IBM’s hyperledger-based blockchain platform offers a suite of enterprise solutions and services World Wire system provide secure decentralized computing IBM is part of a consortium using , and has partnered with The Freshwater Trust and the University of Colorado Boulder using . blockchains to build a health utility network to combat drought in California through sustainable management of drought water blockchain technology and IOT The company’s that Bitcoin could reach $1 million/BTC one day and stated they may be open to working with Bitcoin in the future. Head of Blockchain Solutions believes Walmart After a successful two-year pilot project with IBM’s blockchain platform, Walmart will be by September 2019. This will allow the company to more efficiently track every bag of produce and determine where food was sourced from in seconds instead of days. requiring lettuce and spinach suppliers to input detailed information about their food into a blockchain database Intel (SGX) that can increase the privacy and efficiency of blockchain transactions. The company is a member of three blockchain consortiums, the EEA, Hyperledger, and R3, and is to develop enhanced blockchain-based identity management technologies. Intel has developed Software Guard Extensions working with T-mobile The “helps organizations prepare blockchain infrastructure investments, generate excellent total cost of ownership with general-purpose hardware, and accelerate time to market with a turnkey solution optimized for important software libraries.” Intel Select Solution for Blockchain Apple Apple hasn’t publicly announced any significant internal initiatives focused on blockchains. They recently made that mentions their work in developing blockchain guidelines for the “ ”. an SEC Filing Responsible Business Alliance’s Responsible Minerals Initiative Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has revealed that he holds small amounts of BTC and ETH after having due to not wanting to deal with the stress of high volatility. He has . sold the bulk of it during the most recent bubble described Ethereum as a platform that could one day be as influential as Apple Elon Musk (Tesla, SpaceX) Elon Musk called Bitcoin “brilliant” in a . He doesn’t believe it would be wise for Tesla to get involved with crypto, but his support for the technology could lead to future endeavors in this space. podcast interview with Ark Invest 2018 Industry Surveys A of over 1000 executives from seven countries across the world found that 74% of companies see a compelling business use case for blockchain technology. A in technology found that 48% of respondents feel it was “very likely/likely” that blockchains will change the way their companies do business in the next three years. 84% of respondents to are “actively involved with blockchain”. Deloitte Survey KPMG survey of several hundred global leaders PWC’s survey Open Disruption, or the Rearchitecting of a Closed Status Quo? Ledgers and money are technologies that serve as key foundations for our social institutions, so it’s crucial to distinguish between the separate trends at play right now. Some companies are embracing public blockchains and cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum, working towards a radical rethinking of the way we interact with money, conduct business, and organize to achieve common goals. Others are using permissioned chains primarily to increase the efficiency of existing operations. Some firms are experimenting with public and permissioned systems. Who will play a more significant role? The Dorseys, Ohanians, Krogers, Starbucks, and Fidelities that are embracing open protocols, or the J.P. Morgans and Walmarts that are rolling out more centralized products? To what extent will Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Amazon embrace public blockchains, and what sort of consumer facing applications will they build with them? Will we see significant interaction between permissioned chains and public ones? It’s easy to dismiss permissioned blockchains as meaningless and I don’t find them very exciting. But the fact is that the companies working with them have the power to shape the perceptions and behaviors of the general public, especially in the developed world, who currently doesn’t care much about “decentralization”, monetary theory, or central banking policy. Adoption isn’t just about building innovative technology. It’s driven heavily by psychological and social factors: trust, greed, passion, fear, and tribalism. The systems we choose to build and the stories we tell about them will determine the role cryptocurrencies and blockchains play in our lives. The manner in which the world’s largest companies use blockchain technology will have a significant influence on its evolution and long-term societal impact. “Will this be technology vs. humanity or will it be technology for humanity? It is up to us to decide. can solve problems. can bake humanity into the code. can work to make sure this new movement ferries us toward a more equitable, just, and progressive future” — (P. 291) We We We Unblocked: How Blockchains Will Change Your Business (And What To Do About It)
