Transformation challenges in blockchain adoption by large companies – Cigref, France, October 2018
Blockchain is an extremely innovative information-exchange protocol that skilfully combines known and mastered technologies. Its use may prove disruptive in many sectors because of its industrial potential for disintermediating all stakeholders that act as trusted third parties, but also in terms of security, cost reduction and service speed.
While some may see it as a threat because of the risk of disintermediation, or even obsolescence of business models, and others may see it as an opportunity because it simplifies exchanges, many agree that blockchain should generate profound changes in business-to-business relationships and could revolutionize their economic models.
Although it presents the different types of blockchains, this document is intended for managers and decision-makers who want to understand the impacts and challenges of this protocol for companies: cultural, legal, governance-related and technological.
It re-examines the notion of a “trusted third party” in light of the paradigm shift implied by blockchain: moving from x2y2x (B2B2B, C2B2C, etc.) to x2x, or in other words, moving from a traditional hub-and-spoke exchange model to a collaborative network model in which trust is no longer centralized in one third-party actor but distributed across all actors in a blockchain.
This document also focuses on two areas:
- the legal approach to blockchain, so that lawyers and IT professionals can understand each other and work together;
- the impact on the IT function, explaining how blockchain may involve significant changes in the technical teams that implement it.
Finally, to move from theory to practice, the document offers decision-makers four courses of action.
Cigref is a network of large companies and public administrations whose mission is to develop its members’ ability to integrate and master digital technology. Through the quality of its thinking and the representativeness of its members, it is a unifying force and an important player in digital society.
