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Blockchain, Data Governance, and Smart Contracts in a Post-COVID-19 World

Posted on April 20, 2020 Updated on November 28, 2023

The last few months have been very disruptive to nearly everyone across the globe. There are business challenges galore, such as managing large remote workforces – many of whom are new to working remotely and managing risk while attempting to conduct “business as usual.” Unfortunately, most businesses’ systems, processes, and internal controls were not designed for this “new normal.”

While there have been many predictions around Blockchain for the past few years, it is still not widely adopted. We are beginning to see an uptick in adopting Supply Chain Management Systems for reasons that include traceability of items – especially food and drugs. However, large-scale adoption has been elusive to date.

I believe we will soon begin to see large shifts in mindset, investments, and effort towards modern digital technology driven by Data Governance and Risk Management. I also believe that this will lead to these technologies becoming easier to use via new platforms and integration tools, which will lead to faster adoption by SMBs and other non-enterprise organizations, and that will lead to the greater need for DevOps, Monitoring, and Automation solutions as a way to maintain control of a more agile environment.

Here are a few predictions:

1. New wearable technology supporting Medical IoT will be developed to help provide an early warning system for disease and future pandemics. That will fuel a number of innovations in various industries, including Biotech and Pharma.
   • Blockchain can provide data privacy, ownership, and provenance to ensure the data’s veracity.
   • New legislation will be created to protect medical providers and other users of that data from being liable for missing information or trends that could have saved lives or avoided some other negative outcome.
   • In the meantime, Hospitals, Insurance Providers, and others will do everything possible to mitigate the risk of using Medical IoT data, which could include Smart Contracts to ensure compliance (which assumes that a benefit is provided to the data providers).
   • Platforms may be created to offer individuals control over their own data, how it is used and by whom, ownership of that data, and payment for the use of that data. This is something I wrote about in 2013.
2. Data Governance will be taken more seriously by every business. Today companies talk about Data Privacy, Data Security, or Data Consistency, but few have a strategic end-to-end systematic approach to managing and protecting their data and company.
   • Comprehensive Data Governance will become a driving and gating force as organizations modernize and grow. Even before the pandemic, there were growing needs due to new data privacy laws and concerns around areas such as the data used for Machine Learning.
   • In a business environment where more systems are distributed, there is an increased risk of data breaches and Cybercrime. That must be addressed as a foundational component of any new system or platform.
   • One or two Data Integration Companies will emerge as undisputed industry leaders due to their capabilities around MDM, Data Provenance and Traceability, and Data Access (an area typically managed by application systems).
   • New standardized APIs akin to HL7 FHIR will be created to support a variety of industries as well as interoperability between systems and industries. Frictionless integration of key systems become even more important than it is today.
3. Anything that can be maintained and managed in a secure and flexible distributed digital environment will be implemented to allow companies to quickly pivot and adapt to new challenges and opportunities on a global scale.
   • Smart Contracts and Digital Currency Payment Processing Systems will likely be core components of those systems.
   • This will also foster the growth of next-generation Business Ecosystems and collaborations that will be more dynamic.
   • Ongoing compliance monitoring, internal and external, will likely become a priority (“trust but verify”).

All in all, this is exciting from a business and technology perspective. Most companies must review and adjust their strategies and tactics to embrace these concepts and adapt to the coming New Normal.

The steps we take today will shape what we see and do in the coming decade so it is important to quickly get this right, knowing that whatever is implemented today will evolve and improve over time.