Blockchain is an emerging innovative technology that is being adopted by a variety of industries. The following describes standard use cases in various industries.
Energy
Energy companies are using blockchain technology to create peer-to-peer platforms for energy trading and to facilitate access to renewable energy. As an example, consider the following uses:
- Energy companies whose operations are based on blockchain have created a trading platform to sell electricity between individuals. Homeowners with solar panels use this platform to sell excess solar power to their neighbors. The process is almost completely automated: smart meters create transactions and the blockchain records them.
- Thanks to blockchain crowdfunding initiatives, users can sponsor and maintain solar panels in neighborhoods without access to electricity. Also, once the solar panels are installed, sponsors can receive rent for them.
Finance
Traditional financial systems (e.g. banks and stock exchanges) use blockchain services to manage online payments, accounts and market trading. For example, Singapore Exchange Limited, an investment holding company that provides trading services across Asia, uses blockchain technology to conduct more efficient interbank settlement. The introduction of blockchain technology has solved several problems, including batch processing and manual reconciliation of several thousand financial transactions.
Multimedia and Entertainment
Multimedia and entertainment companies are using blockchain to manage copyright data. Copyright verification plays a key role in determining fair remuneration for creators. Several transactions are required to capture the sale or transfer of copyrighted content. Sony Music Entertainment Japan utilizes blockchain services to improve the efficiency of technical copyright protection tools. The successful application of blockchain strategy has increased the efficiency of copyright protection while reducing costs.
Retail
Retailers are using blockchain to track the movement of goods between suppliers and customers. For example, Amazon has filed a patent for a distributed ledger system that will use blockchain technology to authenticate all goods sold on the platform. On Amazon, sellers can map their global supply chains, allowing participants (manufacturers, couriers, distributors, end users and secondary users) to add events to the registry after registering with a certificate authority.
