A new report by Print 2025 has shed further light on the potential of blockchain technology.
Admitting that the technology has received a tremendous amount of hype since its first development, Print 2025 identifies various sectors, including cybersecurity, that has been “starting to invest in unpicking reality from hype.” However, the company continues, “its broad relevance means every sector needs to pay attention to its disruptive and evolutionary potential” – including the print industry.
The new report, entitled The Blockchain Opportunity, professes to take a balanced look at where the technology can add value to the printing industry, as well as solving existing issues; it also examines hurdles in place of its wider adoption, and other challenges to be faced.
Blockchain is most useful in terms of transactions, with Print 2025 arguing that “practically every aspect of business and daily life involves a transaction of some kind.” Print, meanwhile, has become largely an “as-a-service’ provision, with blockchain representing “an inflection point around which digital transformation projects can pivot.”
“Growing awareness of the threat posed by IoT-enabled devices such as MFPs means controlling, patching and monitoring the print ecosystem will require an enhanced degree of security and integrity, which blockchain can offer,” Print 2025 argues. “The secure storage and authentication of business-critical documents is another key driver for investment in blockchain.”
Furthermore, “protecting intellectual property is increasingly important in an environment where corporate espionage and cyberthreats are escalating. Ensuring that documents are protected from unauthorised modification or exfiltration is a useful application for blockchain within corporate workflows.”
Print 2025’s report also touches upon 3D printing (“arguably the most exciting and disruptive advance in print technology for a generation”) and the boost blockchain can give to additive manufacturing, as well as its ability to be “a pathway to resolving the challenges of digital rights management and licensing inherent in additive manufacturing processes.”
“IP theft is a growing issue in a world where anyone with a 3D printer and access to CAD files can potentially create products and components,” the company says. “Safety concerns and commercial risks require a solution that creates a “chain of trust” between licensee and service provider and also delivers visibility over the production process, which block chain could provide.”
Print 2025 concedes that “there are undoubtedly challenges for print sector companies planning to incorporate blockchain,” naming such examples as “scalability and the costs of running enterprise blockchain networks,” as well as the fact that “the relative level of knowledge around the technology remains low.”
“Similarly, its birth as the foundation technology for bitcoin has led to risk perceptions that are higher than might really be merited, leading to reticence from decision-makers,” the company adds.
However, it recommends reading further for more knowledge on the technology’s potential, opportunities, and indeed, risks, with the report containing further analysis on blockchain and its place in the print industry.
To purchase and read the report in full, click here, or for more background on blockchain, read The Recycler’s feature in Issue 310, available online here.
