The role of enterprise blockchain

In the beginning was Ethereum

And the enterprise fell in love with the idea, but the enterprise needed privacy, compliance around identity (KYC, permissioned access) and finality. So, either “fix” Ethereum?which gives you Quorum or start from scratch with gives you R3 Corda or Hyperledger.

But what if you solved the wrong problem? Enterprise blockchain was built for the incumbent. Their problem is about optimizing the world as it is, not in building a new world. Blockchain, or web3, just like web 1.0 or web 2.0 is about building new markets and new types of businesses built on a new social contract

Turns out you can best solve optimization of today’s business model problems with a central database.

Compare to web 1.0

The break through web 1.0 businesses were not built by the incumbent, like a bricks and mortar book shop. They were built by the start up, like Amazon, with new business models that were now possible.??It is the same with web3, new business models, only possible with web3, will be built by start ups, operating in white spaces, where there is no legacy to either integrate into, or compete against

But the incumbent will have their day. Both Apple and Microsoft were incumbent enterprises in 1999. Neither led the first wave of new business models made possible with web1.0. But today they are the biggest beneficiaries of web1.0 as they reinvented themselves into these new models??

Turns out, we need an on-ramp for ERP

The enterprises that benefit from web3, in the way Apple and Microsoft benefited from web 1.0 will rebuild their business models. So they will need to integrate the old with the new in a hybrid. That on ramp, in this hybrid, is the role of the enterprise. Is this on ramp to web3, at the level of each individual enterprise, like this

Or is the on ramp at the level of a private permissioned network of enterprises, with a lower level common view of the truth?? Like this...

I think at the very centre of this lies the incentive to collaborate and at scale. I think it is impossible to do this without a token. Yes, you can build a token on permissioned rails but can you scale to get network effects of hundreds or thousands of enterprises in this model in a totally open and neutral way? My experience is that you can't. Therefore you have built a valid sub domain on the new internet - an intranet if you will - but you built a LAN, not a WAN.

So with enterprise blockchain you are fixing the world as it is, not building a new world. Very useful, very helpful, very valuable - but optimisation, not web3 transformation.