Adoption

Financial use cases

Blockchain technology have been in the spotlight for quite a while now and if you thought that is where the rabbit hole ends, you couldn’t have been further away from the truth.

Blockchain is indeed showing signs of being more than just Bitcoin and crypto. Many non-financial players are starting to see the blockchain technology as the perfect solution owing to its transparent and decentralized environment. Let’s look at some recent cases.

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Brave (BAT) partners with Dow Jones
In April 2018, the privacy web browser Brave and Dow Jones Media Group announced their partnership to test the usage of the blockchain technology in media and advertising. As per the agreement, Brave will provide access to premium content from Dow Jones Media Group to a limited number of users — of which there are about 2 million people — on a first-come, first-serve basis.

As per the partnership agreement, Barron’s and MarketWatch will become verified publishers on the blockchain technology platform developed by Brave called BAT (Basic Attention Token). BAT will be used to reward the users for looking at advertisements they choose to see (consent-based ads) and also pay the publishers for an ad-free browsing experience.

Basic Attention Token utilises the Ethereum blockchain and aims to improves the efficiency of digital advertising by creating a new token that can be exchanged between publishers, advertisers, and users.

It will be able to measure user attention and serve more relevant ads in the process. The advertisers get a near-perfect assessment of user engagement, publishers receive an ad inventory according to the choices of their audiences and the end users are not harassed with ads they don’t want to see.

BlockGrain — The Grain Chain Tracker
Queensland, Australia, startup BlockGrain is an Agtech startup which was founded in 2015 and is aimed at providing a solution to the real-life problems that are faced by the agriculture industry today.

It recently launched its first agriculture ICO and is looking forward to raising $25 million through the issue of its cryptocurrency, Agri.

With this, it plans to come up with the perfect solution that can track the grain from a farm during the harvest to the end user using the blockchain technology. Farmers, grain brokers, trucking companies and the end users can keep a track of the supply chain using the mobile software making the process more transparent and efficient.

Although, at present, the software program is developed for the grain industry, at a later time it could also expand to fruit, vegetable, wool, and livestock industries.

BlockGrain’s blockchain technology has already proved successful after its trial test runs by grain brokers for two harvests. BlockGrain also signed up RiseAgri as its first major client last year. It has already managed to raise $3.5 million pre-sale contributions from everyday investors which will be a part of the $25 million it looks to raise. The token sales began on April 26 and will run till June 2018.

Power Ledger joins forces with Greenwood Solutions
Power Ledger, which is one of Australia’s most successful blockchain startups, has teamed up with Greenwood Solutions to deploy its P2P (peer-to-peer) energy trading platform to provide energy solutions. As per this partnership, Greenwood Solutions will install solar power systems in four strata units in the state of Victoria, while Power Ledger’s platform would be used to distribute the solar energy efficiently.

The model will allow the supply of renewable energy to residents while at the same time reducing the cost of electricity.

It will also allow the residents to store up the extra solar energy produced in the solar batteries and earn blockchain ‘tokens’, trade it with their neighbours through transparent and auditable agreements and later exchange the tokens for dollars.

Thus, using the blockchain platform the residents would be able to easily buy and sell renewable power and avoid the complexity of electrical billing.

“Power Ledger is focused on creating a platform for consumer-owned, low-cost, low-carbon energy systems and this deployment in Melbourne brings us a step closer to our goal of democratising power”, said David Martin, Power Ledger Managing Director.

Blockchain Technology for Digital Diplomas
Last year, APPII launched the first ever blockchain career verification platform. The company specializes in verifying the details on the resume of a person using the blockchain so the employer can be assured that the candidate is in fact who he says he is and possesses all the skills mentioned.

“It makes candidates far more employable because they can use the blockchain to verify their career history, and have it trusted, and it benefits employers by diminishing time and cost to find talent,” says Gary McKay, MD.

APPII’s platform allows the candidates to record their professional achievements or educational qualifications and certifications on the distributed ledger so that it can then be verified and permanently recorded. It also uses facial recognition technology that can verify the identity of the candidate by comparing it with official documents like passports. The system is already available for users of Technojobs service which is a platform for candidates looking for employment opportunities in IT and technical roles.