Blockchain Billionaires: How Trillions of Dollars Are Set to Be Disrupted by Billions of Users

By Dhwanit Shah

With increasing use cases of the open ledger across product categories and service domains, blockchain technology is poised to change the very face of business verticals and ecosystems worldwide.

Blockchain has enormous potential that has only just begun to unravel. The adoption of the open ledger is moving forward, the number of use cases is increasing, and regulators are coming abroad to expand the adoption potential. Despite these positive developments, many argue that mass blockchain adoption is a distant dream, even as blockchain billionaires work behind the scenes to bring the technology to the tipping point. These marches enable blockchain by creating a favorable environment for innovation, collaboration and policy frameworks. In a way, blockchain billionaires are enabling changes in value chains and by offering holistic benefits to stakeholders, they are instrumental in spreading the use of distributed ledger across business ecosystems. Read on to know how this shift is happening, what enablers are causing this shift, and what industries are likely to be hotbeds of blockchain innovation in the future:

1. CBDCs and tokenization: Blockchain is expected to disrupt the value chain primarily in two ways: Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDCs) and tokenization of assets. Citi Group’s report estimated that by 2030, CBDCs worth up to $5 trillion will be part of global economies with nearly half of these digital currencies powered by blockchain technology. With the majority of central banks around the world either having issued or in the process of issuing digital currencies, the path to mass blockchain adoption will go through the CBDCs. The list of nations with CBDCs in their priority agenda includes China and India, both of which account for more than a third of the world’s total population and thus represent a large potential for adopting blockchain technology. The other important lever on which mass adoption of distributed ledger anchors is tokenization, the process by which assets are converted into tokens that can be used on blockchain networks. Whether financial or real-world assets, tokenization is expected to drive future growth for both categories with estimates projecting the token category to reach $4 trillion in market capitalization by 2030 with 80x growth in the private sector alone. Clearly, the growth potential is huge and may sound too good to be true – right?

2. Adoption possibilities: To successfully drive mass adoption, blockchain technology will need the support of a few key enablers right from the basic levels of understanding to advanced degrees of integration. Prominent among these enablers are decentralized identities, secure bridges, oracle technology, and zero-knowledge proofs. The support of decision makers in terms of open and constructive frameworks is critically important to take the blockchain adoption movement to the masses. It is also important to have access to developed legal models that will help standardize global finance and trade models for similar sets of rules and regulations. This will remove the uncertainty and by having all stakeholders in the ecosystem on the same page, the path to mass adoption of the blockchain will be easier and clearer.

3. Real-world use cases: While the use of blockchain is quite significant in the FinTech industry, the growing awareness of benefits associated with the use of distributed ledger is helping the technology to spread its wings far and wide. The prominent areas where the use of blockchain is likely to find favor include real estate, escrow payments, brand communication and the insurance industry. Blockchain’s ability to keep records immutable and distribute them through participating stakeholders is also finding benefits among automotive professionals, supply chain and logistics managers, and import and export professionals. Furthermore, blockchain technology is expected to make major inroads in, among other things, the health sector, digital advertising, share trading and cyber security.

Blockchain technology is revolutionary and its potential to completely transform business verticals is just beginning to materialize. It is high time that organizations start investing in distributed ledgers and integrating blockchains into their functional procedures and operational mechanisms. A head start in the use of technology will not only multiply existing opportunities, but also open up new revenue streams for companies. Therefore, it is mandatory to stick to the innovations in the blockchain sector and embrace them wholeheartedly to get the most out of these innovations.

The author is Senior Vice President, MSys Technologies

Follow us on TwitterFacebook, LinkedIn