Business partnerships are legal relationships between two or more parties to carry out business as co-owners with the aim of making and sharing the profit. Like any other collaboration, business partnerships require mutual trust between the respective partners. Information sharing between clients, suppliers, and companies is also a vital part of the management of such partnerships.
What Is Blockchain?
Blockchain technology may just be the magic bullet required for these collaborations by creating reliable and common records through blockchain distributed ledgers and smart contracts. This article will assess whether or not blockchain technology can fundamentally change and simplify business partnerships.
Blockchain is a ledger of decentralized data which specific participants can securely share. Data from different sources can be collected with the help of blockchain cloud services and shared. The data is broken into blocks that, when chained together, form cryptographic hashes. Each block is chained to the previous one in an immutable sequence recorded on a peer-to-peer network.
All participants have their encrypted record of the transactions made within the blockchain, forging trust, accountability, and transparency onto the chain. It eliminates data duplicating, thus increasing the security of the transactions by ensuring data integrity.
Data on the blockchain cannot be altered without approval from a quorum of the parties. Suppose one of the parties tries to alter the data without the other parties’ permission; all the other parties will be notified. Blockchain does not require intermediaries or any additional overhead; this ensures that the parties acquire reliable data.
Benefits of Blockchain Technology in Business Partnerships
Decentralization of Transactions
For a long time, business transactions have required intermediaries; blockchain technology can end the need for third parties in these business transactions. In such collaborations, parties often distrust each other and opt for additional costs to facilitate an intermediary. Blockchain technology does not need a centralized medium such as a bank to oversee such transactions.
This would cut costs used in business partnerships for intermediaries, which can be put to better use. Blockchain can thus create conditions suitable for confidential relations in a business partnership.
Smart Contracts to Execute Contractual Terms
Smart contracts are programs on the blockchain that automatically execute when certain predetermined conditions are fulfilled. They can also automate the next action once the same conditions are met without intermediary involvement.
The terms of the contract are written into code on the blockchain. These rules and algorithms guarantee the proper and efficient implementation of the contractual terms of the business partnerships.
Partner Selection
Choosing an appropriate partner is necessary for any business partnership; partners are required to have a good reputation and fulfill all the requirements necessary to acquire such a position in the partnership. Blockchain may come in handy in the simplification of the partner selection process.
Managers require information on their respective partners to determine their trustworthiness. This can be derived from their past engagements and experience, which may neither be present to the public nor trackable.
There is little room for the collaborators to cheat as blockchain technology ensures that all identifying information is shared with all partners. Questionable characters will also refrain from entering into business partnerships supported by blockchain.
Synchronized and Timely Data updates
Timing is only as important as speed in any business partnership. Blockchain transactions take approximately three minutes, thus no delay in updating data. Information on the blockchain is stored on interconnected unchangeable blocks to make up a chain. The blocks are recorded in nodes that provide timely updates whenever a new node is added to the blockchain.
When a new node is added, it automatically downloads onto the preexisting blocks, synchronizing the information for all the participants. This can be useful in the formation and execution of agreements; for instance, during the negotiation phase, specific protocols which define the nature of the business partnership are added to the blockchain.
Data Confidentiality
Blockchain technology offers enhanced transactional security because it requires consent from all the parties before any transaction, also all transactions are unchangeable. It is nearly impossible to hack blockchain due to the encryption of all transactions and the distributed consensus of the data nodes where each record is connected to the other.
Hacking this requires the altering of the entire chain to change a single record. Consequently, this can ensure that all the partnership’s data is safe and secure from malicious hackers.
Some Concerns about Blockchain Technology
Blockchain technology it’s still facing some teething problems as it is incorporated into different sectors. Some blockchain features can be lethal to business partnerships. For instance, the unchangeable nature of blockchain can be disadvantageous when transactions are initiated by mistake; one cannot cancel such an operation.
Blockchain also faces difficulties in scalability, unlike other systems. However, these concerns are temporary as more advancements are made in blockchain technology daily, and the future looks bright.
Authors Take
Blockchain technology has moved beyond its buzzword status; it is today incorporated in different sectors as a solution to different challenges. The decentralized nature of blockchains and security make it favorable for business partnerships that require trust and transparency from all parties.
Blockchain technology may be just what such collaborations need to simplify their work. There are notable shortcomings in this technology that are alarming to any partnership that considers adopting the technology; they may require the understanding that this technology works better in some conditions than others.
However, the future looks bright for this technology, and its importance in different sectors will only continue to grow over time thus will be relevant in business partnerships.
Source: https://crypto.news/can-blockchain-simplify-business-partnerships/