This article examines the technical feasibility of DLT to handle enterprise requirements and demands. The authors investigate the strategic value that blockchain technologies bring to the table, examine potential use cases in various business domains, and discuss the challenges involved in the realization of these use cases. They explore how the nature of certain businesses makes them better suited for blockchain technology and discuss the best practices involved in developing blockchain-based applications.

This issue of Cutter Business Technology Journal (CBTJ) continues the conversation we began in our last CBTJ and focuses on blockchain technology adoption beyond cryptocurrencies and financial services. The authors explore areas such as energy and utilities and government and present real examples of successful DLT implementations. They share their practical experiences in overcoming and addressing some of the known issues with blockchain projects.

This article focuses on how new regulations in the financial services industry and innovative technologies enhance customer experience (CX) by making services more efficient, faster, and less expensive. The authors describe new directives — such as the second Payment Services Directive (PSD2), applicable across the European Economic Area — that, together with new technologies such as blockchain, present a window of opportunity for financial services providers. The authors highlight how service providers, armed with information about target customers and with reduced risk of exposure to fraud, can better serve consumers. The authors also show how leveraging blockchain technology and the PSD2 directive can help deliver better CX and value proposition in the financial services industry.

This article explores the business benefits and technical challenges of blockchain technology implementation in the human resources (HR) domain, specifically in a recruitment space. Recruitment is one of the most critical parts of HR management, one in which there must be an establishment of trust at the beginning of interactions between parties. The authors posit that there is a need for a unified platform where certificates and academic degrees are safely kept in order to ensure the integrity of information and to have a means of verifying the validity of the qualifications, all while ensuring privacy. They propose the design and implementation of a platform exploiting two different open source platforms: Ethereum and Hyperledger Fabric. They then analyze each architecture’s basic features and compare those features to outline lessons learned.

Recently, we described the application of Scrum at Riccardo’s Restaurant in London. This environment is similar to that of Lean hardware Scrum, in that shifts are repeatedly creating and delivering products in short cycles with high quality. Process efficiency and cycle time become the key metrics for production.

In this Advisor, we explore some of the areas in which specific Industry 4.0 technologies can create advances within regulated industries.

It’s always interesting to examine what the big tech giants are doing because their efforts can have a significant impact on consumer expectations and trends and may serve as a wake-up call for other industries. This is certainly the case when it comes to big tech projects in fintech. And nowhere is this more apparent today than when it comes to big tech developments centering around the use of blockchain-based cryptocurrencies as a payment platform and for creating new financial services offerings.

In this Executive Update, we describe the application of Scrum in the restaurant business. This environment is similar to that of Lean hardware Scrum, in that shifts are repeatedly creating and delivering products in short cycles with high quality. Process efficiency and cycle time become the key metrics for production.