He had emphasised, “Risks and rewards are different for companies that move at different speeds.” Then he gave the example of the Marriott group and Airbnb trying to set up shop in a country like Cuba.
With the country coming out of isolation and a normalisation process underway between it and the United States, there is opportunity for the tourism and hospitality industry to address pent-up demand.
But given the very different ways that the Marriot and Airbnb operate, which company is likely to provide service first, in Cuba?
The answer is a resounding “Airbnb” and one tick in the checkbox for disruptors against larger established organisations that lack agility and flexibility.
And being right in the middle of business activity all around the world, gives Hitachi Data Systems, amazing visibility into the IT capabilities that are in hot demand by organisations today.
Fintech, fintech, fintech
Hitachi Data Systems is one technology company that is actively participating in the fintech economy with a research organisation for fintech established last March in the Silicon Valley.
One fintech trend that they are heavily researching is Blockchain.
Blockchain is an open-source distributed database using state-of-the-art cryptography. It is also the technology that is enabling cryptocurrency like Bitcoin because of its ability to facilitate collaboration and tracking of all kinds of transactions.
But what if it could track more than just transactions and the flow of cryptocurrency, by being a ‘ledger’ of truly hyperscale proportions?
In anticipation of more technology disruption on top of what Airbnb, Uber and many more are wreaking upon socio-economies today, HDS has joined a consortium of companies interested in hyperscale distributed ‘ledger’ technology for cryptocurrencies and studying its many more cross-domain applications.
To date, HDS holds the third most fintech patents, after Visa and Bank of America, but with so much activity happening in the financial services industry, and with the worldwide economy resting upon what happens in this sector, HDS is ramping up their efforts.
