If you’ve been part of the decision-making for developing or implementing new tech in your business recently, you must already be aware of blockchain technology. The rapidly growing technology has become a massive part of modern and innovative tech for businesses by offering various enterprise blockchain solutions.
Most large companies globally have already adopted blockchain use or are exploring ways to implement the technology in their organizations. It is becoming commonplace in the business world, which is a testament to its value. The technology has been adopted widely in various industries, including healthcare, FinTech, real estate, gaming, transport, supply chain, and logistics, among many others.
However, its adoption and implementation aren’t easy things to accomplish. Besides the rather stiff learning curve, there are various blockchain platform options you need to choose from. This article looks at the three main things you should consider when selecting a blockchain platform to help you remove the adoption and implementation hurdles along your way.
What is a blockchain platform?
Blockchain is a distributed and decentralized ledger that records the provenance of digital assets. By its design, the data recorded on the blockchain is unchangeable, making it a more secure way to handle payment transactions and sensitive data. However, it must be built on a particular platform.
A blockchain platform is the building block that allows you to develop blockchain-based applications. Essentially, platforms will enable you to use existing infrastructure and software to build your applications instead of creating one from scratch. This comes with several benefits, including:
- Security standards
- Transparency and quick accessibility of information
- Data consolidation and sharing
- Integrated tokenization payments
3 things to consider when choosing a blockchain platform
The level of privacy
Before developing your enterprise solution on the blockchain, you need to understand that the technology offers flexible configurations and various privacy levels. Similarly, each platform is different in matters of privacy. If your business handles and transmits rather sensitive information, a blockchain platform’s privacy level needs to be a significant consideration.
This is the first step in helping you decide on the various types of platforms, such as permissionless/public, permissioned/private, or hybrid, which combines principles from public and private blockchains. Go for a platform with a track record of maintaining high privacy and security. Not all your data needs to be visible to everyone, even on a public network. Check if you can take the sensitive data from the public blockchain and have other verification mechanisms.
Level of scalability
A blockchain platform needs to be highly scalable so as to meet the growing needs of a business and the number of participants on the chain. A platform that can’t accommodate growth might become a hindrance in the future or present challenges requiring a change of platforms. For example, how do digital assets fit into your blockchain strategy? Can you issue STO Security Token Offering in the future?
The blockchain platform you choose needs to have room for flexibility. In addition, you need to be aware of a platform’s latency and computational overhead potentials. Typically, as a distributed system grows, it can become difficult to retrieve information quickly from all the nodes. So it’s recommended that you go with a platform that can handle your current and future transactional needs with low latency.
Some of the things to consider when assessing the scalability of a platform include:
- The consensus algorithm
- Transaction/query complexities
- Internet speed in computers involved
- Geographical user distribution
- Distance between nodes
Your accessibility requirements
Every application serves a specific purpose for a particular audience, so it’s critical to determine the accessibility needs of users. In the decentralized ledger technology (DLT) space, the user interface may come through the web, computers, or apps. That means protecting users on the chain by encrypting data which you can achieve with modern Application Programming Interfaces (APIs).
Moreover, you also need to improve the usability of your applications by using generalizable systems, which have a smaller learning curve. You also need to consider the geographic location of the platform users and how that may affect accessibility. Once you have considered all these things, planning your user’s accessibility requirements becomes easier.
Bottom line
Blockchain technology is rife with opportunities that can transform all industries significantly. While a large portion of the technology is still unexplored, its potential can be seen in the FinTech industry and other sectors. When deciding on the platform you want to build your solutions, it’s therefore critical to consider the discussed items above.
Remember to identify the platform’s privacy levels, scalability, flexibility, and accessibility before adopting a distributed application or platform. This will keep you on track in aligning your needs with the most suitable platform for your business. Hopefully, this article has shed some light on the criteria by which you might begin to connect with the distributed computing sector, create a more versatile business, and have a leg over your competitors.
