The dust is settling around blockchain and distributed ledger technologies.

Platforms such as Ethereum seek to position blockchain as a transparent, global computer upon which anyone can codify actions and states, such as smart contracts.

Their story goes that anything, in principle, can be represented and computed on the chain.

The core value proposition is straightforward: tamper-proof, append-only logs where changes to data are provably correct.

But because of the way code-on-chain works, the language used must be very constrained to ensure correct behaviour. That’s why many platforms force users to use specific programming languages to construct things like smart contracts, leading to fragmentation and inefficiency.

As a result, major problems arise in the areas of cloud and legacy systems integration, fine-grained privacy, on-demand provisioning and true distributed intelligence.

It’s always been hard for enterprises, such as banks and reinsurers, to make distributed machines, systems and applications work together. It’s commonly accepted that a unified or holistic approach should be encouraged.

The question therefore is how to deliver the core value of blockchain given the swamp of black box systems clogging up every business today.

As with every wave of new technology, it’s all about balance - and that is exactly where SPARKL Clear Box® comes in.

SPARKL provides a powerful DevOps tool to manage blockchain challenges such as vendor lock-in, systems integration and application-specific privacy for your business. But how does it work?

Read the Blockchain Brief