Q & A: What does blockchain actually mean for manufacturers?

Put simply – No.   Blockchain is all too often confused with crypto-currencies; they just are one solution built on the technology.  Blockchain offers a fundamentally new approach to sharing information between people and organisations – one that is built on trust and by sharing the ledger (list of records) enforces an immutable statement of truth that can be therefore be used to ensure security. On top of that, the idea of smart contracts allows machine to machine transaction (contracts) to be executed automatically.

There are so many ways – but for just one example - think of the costs involved in managing the supply chain and ensuring provenance – Blockchains with smart contracts can automate these processes, reduce the cost to marginal levels and ensure that a company’s resources are focused on the value added tasks so increasing productivity at lower cost.

The benefits will depend on the exact use case as per the one described above. However, the key benefits of Blockchains can probably be summarised ultimately as reductions in cost, increased provenance across complex supply chains, and increased security especially for connected products,