The Linux Foundation has unveiled a collaborative effort to advance blockchain technology, with the intention of developing an enterprise grade, open source distributed ledger framework and free developers to focus on building “robust, industry-specific applications, platforms and hardware systems to support business transactions.”
Blockchain is a digital technology for recording and verifying transactions. The distributed ledger is a permanent, secure tool that makes it easier to create cost-efficient business networks without requiring a centralized point of control.
With distributed ledgers, virtually anything of value can be tracked and traded. The application of this emerging technology is showing great promise in the enterprise.
For example, it allows securities to be settled in minutes instead of days. It can be used to help companies manage the flow of goods and related payments or enable manufacturers to share production logs with OEMs and regulators to reduce product recalls.
Early commitments to this work come from Accenture, ANZ Bank, Cisco, CLS, Credits, Deutsche Börse, Digital Asset Holdings, DTCC, Fujitsu Limited, IC3, IBM, Intel, J.P. Morgan, London Stock Exchange Group, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), R3, State Street, SWIFT, VMware and Wells Fargo.
Distributed ledger systems are being built across industries, but to realize the promise of this emerging technology, an open source and collaborative development strategy that supports multiple players in multiple industries is required. This development can enable the adoption of blockchain technology at a pace and depth not achievable by any one company or industry.
This type of shared or external Research & Development (R&D) has proven to deliver billions in economic value. The collaboration is expected to help identify and address important features and currently missing requirements for a cross-industry open standard for distributed ledgers that can transform the way business transactions are conducted globally.
Several founding members have already invested in considerable research and development efforts exploring blockchain applications for industry. IBM intends to contribute tens of thousands of lines of its existing codebase and its corresponding intellectual property to this open source community. Digital Asset is contributing the Hyperledger mark, which will be used as the project name, as well as enterprise grade code and developer resources.
R3 is contributing a new financial transaction architectural framework designed to specifically meet the requirements of its global bank members and other financial institutions. These technical contributions, among others from a variety of companies, will be reviewed in detail in the weeks ahead by the formation and Technical Steering Committees.
Last week, the Cloud Native Computing Foundation, a Linux Foundation Collaborative Project and organization dedicated to advancing the development of cloud native applications and services, announced new members from across the industry, its formal open governance structure and new details about its technology stack.
The intent to form the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) was announced earlier this year at OSCON to support development in a cloud native environment. Cloud native applications are container-packaged, dynamically scheduled and microservices-oriented.
The foundation focuses on development of open source technologies, reference architectures and common format for Cloud native applications or services. This work provides the necessary infrastructure for Internet companies and enterprises to scale their businesses.
This work is resource intensive, requiring companies to assemble a team of experts that can integrate disparate technologies and maintain all of them. The foundation also seeks to improve overall developer experience, paving the way for faster code reuse, improved machine efficiency, reduced costs and increases in the overall agility and maintainability of applications.
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