A number of large corporations, including Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, and SAP, have started to take notice of, and invest in, blockchain technology. Enterprise customers are interested in the blockchain because it can help reduce fraud, increase transparency, and provide secure record keeping. Blockchain technology has started showing up in such diverse fields as cybersecurity, insurance, and supply chain management.
Less technically savvy corporations are starting to dip their toes in the water, but there’s a huge gap between the desire to invest in blockahin technology and developers with the skills to implement it. Not being able to meet the demand in-house, some companies are looking to find service providers who can make the task easier. A number of companies have sprung up in this “Blockchain-as-a-Service” market, which is predicted to grow to $20 Billion in size by 2025.
Here’s a look at some of the existing players in this space, and some new contenders that will become operational in 2018.
The NEM Foundation, based in Singapore, exists to promote the use of the NEM platform. NEM started back in 2014 as a fork of another project, but since then has ‘grown up’ by targeting the Enterprise blockchain market and establishing partnerships with many other organizations.
NEM is a good solution for Enterprise customers interested in running a private blockchain entirely on their own servers, or connecting their in-house software to the public NEM blockchain. Since NEM has a RESTful, JSON-based API, it’s easy to connect to it from any modern programming language. NEM doesn’t offer full Smart Contracts like Ethereum, but it does have very simple to create Smart Assets (think digital identities or tokens) which may cover the majority of use cases an Enterprise customer is interested in.
NEM has an existing customer base and is growing rapidly in the South-east Asia and European markets. It recently set up shops in New Zealand and Malaysia as part of a $40 million expansion plan.
