The world is split into 3 groups - believers of cryptocurrency, non-believers(including people who do not want it to grow), unaware/ignorant people. While the believers and non-believers fight in social media & news channels, there are a group of people who continue to make money. Exchanges keep minting for all the trades. The prolonged bear phase this year has made many people leave, especially the ones who entered last year based on speculative price.
There is another side of the story, though cryptocurrency is struggling this whole year, the technology which powers it is growing exponentially. Blockchain is moving out of being buzz word to real-world implementations. Enterprises are taking it seriously, many research projects are going on in almost all the major enterprises. Fintech is betting big on Blockchain.
Recently, Amazon and Huawei announced their availability of managed Blockchain services to the businesses. Something similar to AWS and other Cloud services. Few years back Cloud services were buzz word, now almost everything is being run on cloud. Desktop applications have moved to cloud based services. Multi year licensing of software has moved to usage based subscription model. As we witness these changes, I would conclude that it won't take too long to see Blockchain implementations playing a key role in how businesses are managed.
IBM, Intel, HP, JP Morgan Chase etc have developed and offer their own Blockchain solutions. All the industries from finance to automobile, logistics to govt agencies, everyone are trying their hands on booming Blockchain technology.
If you are interested to dig deeper into enterprise blockchain solutions, head over to this Medium post.
Technical universities around the world have sense the need of Blockchain education and offering advanced courses in Blockchain technology. Research scholars take up Blockchain projects, it has become next best preference after AI/ML & IoT. Some of the universities offer Masters degree in digital currencies.
IIIT Bangalore has added a module on Blockchain, cryptocurrency in their course curriculum. Reputed universities like Harvard, UC-Berkeley, Princeton University also offer Blockchain courses.
University of Nicosia, Cyprus offers Masters Degree.
There are many Blockchain conferences happening all around the world. This shows the hunger for innovation, talent and solutions for the real-world use cases. Some of the events are even funded by governments. Recently concluded Internation Blockchain Congress in Hyderabad witnessed an array of speakers discussing about various solutions and possibilities with Blockchain technology. Another successful event was World Blockchain Summit.
Apart from major conferences, there are many small groups and meetups who organize & collaborate on Blockchain technology.
Talent acquisition has become pricey for Blockchain solutions. Startups and enterprises are looking for talented folks for developing advanced solutions and also to implement existing frameworks to global customers.
While the many debate on cryptocurrency being bubble and speculative but they do not ignore the fact of how Blockchain will change the facet of future transactions.
Disclaimer: I'm neither paid nor an affiliate of any company/university mentioned in this post.
