Business owners trying to adapt to or adopt the ever-changing new normal have finally appreciated that there’s more to blockchain than some uncanny cryptocurrency they never bought and missed out on netting millions of dollars. The true potential of blockchain is found in enterprise-oriented blockchain technologies businesses can use to unleash via private and permissioned platforms.
As businesses strive to attain the next level of transformation and extend collaboration and optimization that transcends the organization, there’s a technology that can drive operational agility, automate workflows and introduce new revenue streams. This article explores the four best technologies that show great potential in solving complex enterprise problems.
Enterprises and closed ecosystems like government organizations and banks commonly use permissioned blockchains to drive trust between stakeholders. Commonly referred to as permissioned sandboxes or private blockchains, permissioned blockchains come with an extra layer or are closed and have an additional security layer that allows only authorized participants to perform specific actions. While they share some features like anonymity, decentralization, and governance with public blockchains, permissioned blockchains are more efficient in their performance as they’re more flexible and scalable, besides offering a customizable governance structure created for closed groups.
Permissioning is among the numerous incredible features that make permissioned blockchains excellent as it helps secure and protects data as contrasted with public blockchains. An end result is a unified approach that eliminates the presence of humanly conceivable misrepresentation and blunders, thereby saving organizations time, labor, and related costs. Some benefits of permissioned blockchains include the following:
Generally, all nodes in a network are required to compute and validate transactions meaning some compute redundant transactions. Permissioned blockchains are more efficient than public networks since only member nodes are needed to validate transactions.
There are clearly defined governance structures in permissioned blockchains compared to public blockchains that operate like public forums where any individual node has a say in governance. Debates on updates in permissioned blockchains are easier to settle since only a consortium of participating businesses is involved, as opposed to public arenas with thousands of entities.
Private Blockchains are lighter and, therefore, faster than their public counterparts because their blockchain data is relatively more minor and fewer transactions are involved. Moreover, they responsibly consume energy as they mostly use multi-party voting schemes. Control mechanisms like audits are also more straightforward since known actors run them.
R3 Corda is an open-source permissioned blockchain platform built by a consortium of financial institutions which supports DLT applications that enable enterprises to perform strictly private transactions. Whereas it was initially designed for financial institutions, Corda has since expanded its wings to cover other fields like finance, insurance, healthcare, and digital assets.
R3 Corda’s permissioned ledger type uses an Asynchronous Byzantine Fault Tolerance consensus mechanism that supports smart contracts. Users can write and deploy smart contracts written in Java or Kotlin on the Corda blockchain. The platform doesn’t operate a mining feature meaning parts of transactions are not open to all nodes. Among Corda’s unique features are the following:
R3 operates a pluggable consensus that avails many consensus algorithms to choose from. Microsoft and Intel are leading companies that use Corda as their platform. R3’s service suite enables blockchain experts to build applications and networks by offering an architecture service for design, review, and deployment support. Corda has a unique validity consensus that ensures that different contracts accept transactions besides imputing the required signatures.
A project of the Linux Foundation, Hyperledger Fabric is a permissioned distributed ledger technology designed to develop centralized and decentralized blockchain platforms. Fabric is intended explicitly for businesses interested in using, integrating, or building blockchain-based applications and solutions. Among its key features are the following:
Hyperledger Fabric design resembles Ethereum’s in terms of modular architecture and permissioning. Hyperledger Fabric boasts a plug-and-play interface that allows users to easily select their preferred services, including smart contract types, consensus algorithms, etc. The smart contracts on Fabric can be written in JavaScript, Java, and Go.
Launched in 2018, EOSIO is a highly-performing, open-source blockchain platform offering high-speed, reliable, and highly secure platforms for enterprises interested in building blockchain-based applications. EOSIO facilitates and enables you to deploy smart contracts on its existing network, develop your individualized EOSIO network and deploy smart contracts. The smart contracts can be written using the C++ programming language.
While it’s still considered an underdog compared to leading stalwarts like R3 Corda and Hyperledger, EOSIO boasts some unique selling features that attract developers developing blockchain projects that, include:
As icing on the cake, the EOSIO website does a great job of keeping a vibrant community well-informed with the latest news and events.
Quorum is an open-sourced, permissioned blockchain protocol used by several leading enterprises and is designed specifically for private or consortium blockchain networks. The enterprise-focused blockchain is popular with financial organizations, allowing them to customize it to their specific needs.
Some big names that have adopted Quorum for their business include JP Morgan, Covantis, South African Reserve Bank, and SiaChain, among others. Among Quorum’s main features include:
Like Ethereum, users can write smart contracts in Solidity, making it easy for a seamless switch between Ethereum and Quorum. The platform uses a voting-based algorithm consensus that agrees to blocks and transactions based on the number of votes a transaction or block has from the node.
Private and permissioned blockchains offer a means for enterprises to control the sharing of information within only known and authorized parties. This feature makes it well-suited for any sensitive industry where the preservation of transactional privacy is required.
Popular frameworks like Corda, Hyperledger, EOSIO, and Quorum provide benefits associated with a closed ecosystem that make them fit for use by organizations whose requirements and needs they address. They avail benefits like cost-effectiveness, performance efficiency, and proper governance, making them the best for B2B operations.
