A Deloitte 2018 blockchain survey confirms the increased adoption of blockchain technology in business. The study on 1053 senior executives from blue-chip companies show that 95 percent of them had budgets set for blockchain projects.

This rising interest in the technology is affirmed by a Gartner study on the impact of blockchain technology in business. The study says:

“The business value-add of blockchain will grow to slightly more than $176 billion by 2025, and then it will exceed $3.1 trillion by 2030.”

In the Deloitte survey, 39 percent of $500 million or more in annual revenue businesses had budgets of over $5 million set for blockchain projects. The study titled “Breaking blockchain open” highlights that the set budgets were for their 2019 blockchain projects.







The International Data Corporation (IDC) similarly forecasts that blockchain spending will have $9.7 billion worth of spending by 2021. The IDC also estimates a five-year CAGR or compound annual growth rate of 81.2 percent between 2016 and 2021.

Blockchain Enhancing Business Processes

Bill Fearnley the research director at IDC’s Worldwide

Blockchain Strategies said:

“Interest and investment in blockchain and distributed ledger technology (DLT) is accelerating as enterprises aggregate data into secure, sequential, and immutable blockchain ledgers, transforming their businesses and operations.”

Bill further adds that more businesses are collaborating with

blockchain-based startups to enhance their revenue building process.

Consortia such as Hyperledger Projects or the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance have become the to-go-to blockchain solution providers. Businesses are using them to improve amongst others their supply chain tracing and tracking processes. They are also used to improve post-trade processing, auditing, and compliance.

Central banks and regulators are using distributed ledger technology to improve speed and efficiency in their banking processes. There are industries sectors such as health, which are increasingly becoming reliant on blockchain innovations. The IDC study says that the financial industry has the highest level of blockchain spending. Retail and professional firms closely follow this sector.

A Shortfall of Blockchain Skills

However, as more business gets into blockchain-oriented projects,

they are encountering a new obstacle. The demand for blockchain skills has

skyrocketed, creating plum jobs for developers with pay packages of over

$300,000. In many regions such as Australia, businesses are left to scuffle

over a small talent pool.

A study by TeQatlas, for instance, shows that the first five months of 2019 had as many blockchain listings as the whole of 2018. TeQatlas says that IBM, PwC, and Oracle are the top blockchain employers of the year. IBM has advertised 335 blockchain vacancies so far.







This proves that businesses are no longer questioning the

importance of blockchain. They are now focused on integrating the technology in

their legacy systems. Goldman Sachs for instance, now has a crypto investing

product for its clients. According to the PwC’s head of fintech and crypto

department Henri Arslanian, 2018 “cleared the noise” over the importance of blockchain. This year, large industry

players are going to position themselves in the crypto world.

True to word, NASDAQ and Symbiont with support from Galaxy Digital, Raptor Group, and Citi are leveraging DLT for their businesses. Symbiont’s proprietary platform Assembly will create digital versions of financial instruments for these firms’ digital asset market. The blockchain consortium R3, on the other hand, is working with the Wall Street Blockchain Alliance on the Corda platform.