Blockchain for Business 2019

Blockchain for Business 2019

by Peter Lipovyanov
Released January 2019
Publisher(s): Packt Publishing
ISBN: 9781789956023

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Book description

Your one-stop guide to blockchain technology and its business applications

Key Features

  • Assimilate blockchain services such as Ethereum and Hyperledger to transform industrial applications
  • Know in and out of blockchain technology to understand various business use cases
  • Understand various common and not-so-common challenges faced in blockchain development

Book Description

Blockchain for Business 2019 is a comprehensive guide that enables you to bring in various blockchain functionalities to extend your existing business models and make correct fully-informed decisions. You will learn how decentralized applications are transforming numerous business sectors that are expected to play a huge role in the future. You will see how large corporations are already implementing blockchain technology now. You will then learn about the various blockchain services, such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Hyperledger, and others to understand their use cases in a variety of business domains. You will develop a solid fundamental understanding of blockchain architecture.

Moving ahead, you will get to grips with the inner workings of blockchain, with detailed explanations of mining, decentralized consensus, cryptography, smart contracts, and many other important concepts. You will delve into a realistic view of the current state of blockchain technology, along with its issues, limitations, and potential solutions that can take it to the next level.

By the end of this book, you will all be well versed in the latest innovations and developments in the emerging blockchain space.

What you will learn

  • Understand the fundamentals of blockchain and how it was developed
  • Gain a good understanding of economic concepts and developments
  • Develop a base for concepts such as cryptography, computer networking, and programming
  • Understand the applications of blockchain and its potential impact on the world
  • Become well versed with the latest developments in the blockchain space
  • Explore blockchain frameworks, including decentralized organizational structures, networks, and applications

Who this book is for

This book is for financial professionals, business executives, managers, and enthusiasts who are interested in getting well-versed with blockchain technology in various business domains. This book will help boost your existing business models using blockchain services. No prior experience of blockchain is required.

Publisher resources

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Table of contents

  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright and Credits
    1. Blockchain for Business 2019
  3. About Packt
    1. Why subscribe?
    2. Packt.com
  4. Contributors
    1. About the author
    2. About the reviewers
    3. Packt is searching for authors like you
  5. Preface
    1. Who this book is for
    2. What this book covers
    3. To get the most out of this book
      1. Download the color images
      2. Conventions used
    4. Get in touch
      1. Reviews
  6. Bitcoin, Blockchain, and Cryptoassets
    1. An introduction to blockchain
      1. The rise of blockchain
    2. Key features of blockchain
      1. Ease of access
      2. Blockchain – the internet of money
        1. The hype of industrial companies around blockchain
    3. Impacts of blockchain
      1. Impacts in the financial sector
      2. Impacts in our daily lives
        1. The Chinese formula scandal
        2. Blood diamonds
    4. Impacts of blockchain on the internet
    5. Summary
  7. A Brief History of Money
    1. An introduction to money
      1. Money as a medium of exchange
      2. Money as a unit of account
      3. Money as a store of value
    2. Money – an abstraction of value
      1. The gold standard
    3. An introduction to fiat currencies
    4. What happens when fiat currency systems fail
    5. How blockchain comes into the picture
    6. Summary
  8. The Birth of Bitcoin and the Advantages of a Decentralized Payment System
    1. How Bitcoin came into existence
      1. The beginning of the economic crisis
      2. The birth of Bitcoin
    2. Projects leading up to Bitcoin
    3. An introduction to Bitcoin
      1. Double-spending and how Bitcoin resolved it
    4. How traditional payment systems work
      1. Electronic transfers in banks
      2. Credit and debit card transactions
      3. Transactions in PayPal
      4. Differences between centralized and decentralized payment systems
    5. Summary
  9. Five Forces of Bitcoin - #1 Blockchain
    1. Introduction to Bitcoin's five forces
    2. The first force – blockchain
      1. Why blockchain is better
      2. How blockchain works
    3. Different types of blockchain
      1. Public blockchains
      2. Private blockchains
      3. Value of blockchain
      4. Areas where blockchain can be handy
    4. Summary
  10. Five Forces of Bitcoin - #2 Cryptography
    1. Introduction to cryptography
      1. Uses of cryptography in early times
    2. Types of cryptography
      1. Cryptographic techniques used in Bitcoin
    3. Hash functions
    4. Digital signatures
    5. Summary
  11. Five Forces of Bitcoin - #3 Consensus Algorithm
    1. The Byzantine Generals' Problem
    2. The Proof-of-Work consensus algorithm
      1. Introduction to mining
        1. The different aspects of a Bitcoin transaction
          1. Nonce and difficulty
          2. The computing power
    3. Decentralized consensus and game theory
      1. Examples of miner misbehavior
      2. Example of double-spending
      3. The architecture surrounding the Bitcoin network
      4. Consensus attacks
    4. Summary
  12. Five Forces of Bitcoin - #4 P2P Network
    1. Introduction to P2P networks
      1. P2P model versus client-server model
      2. Financial transactions
      3. How Bitcoin differs
    2. Nodes of the Bitcoin network
      1. Types of nodes
        1. Full nodes
        2. SPV nodes
    3. The Bitcoin P2P network
      1. The mainnet
      2. The testnet
      3. Additional entities
    4. Summary
  13. Five Forces of Bitcoin - #5 Software Code Base
    1. Introduction to Bitcoin's software code case
      1. Wallets
      2. Blockchain explorer
    2. Bitcoin's scripting language
    3. Bitcoin as an application platform
      1. Asset registry
      2. Crowdfunding
    4. Summary
  14. How Ethereum Took the Idea of Blockchain to the Next Level
    1. Introduction to Ethereum
    2. How Ethereum came into existence
      1. The Theil fellowship
    3. Understanding Ethereum
    4. The Ethereum Virtual Machine
      1. Introduction to virtual machines
    5. Summary
  15. Ethereum - A Global Platform for Decentralized Applications
    1. Decentralized applications based on Ethereum
      1. Types of decentralized applications
    2. Ethereum and initial coin offerings
    3. Decentralized autonomous organizations
      1. The DAO
    4. Summary
  16. Blockchains Focused on Specific Sectors and Use Cases
    1. The different categories of blockchain
    2. Sector-specific public blockchains
      1. Blockchain and IoT
    3. Private blockchains
      1. How blockchain affects privacy
      2. Blockchain cryptoassets dealing with privacy
    4. Summary
  17. Corporate Blockchains
    1. Introduction to corporate blockchains
    2. R3 Corda
      1. The core services provided by blockchains
    3. Hyperledger
      1. The Hyperledger frameworks
        1. Hyperledger Fabric
        2. Hyperledger Sawtooth
          1. Sawtooth architecture
        3. Hyperledger Iroha
        4. Hyperledger Burrow
        5. Hyperledger Indy
    4. Enterprise Ethereum Alliance
    5. Private blockchains for business
    6. Summary
  18. The Disruptive Potential of Blockchain Technology
    1. Blockchain and financial services
      1. How blockchain comes into the picture
      2. Why banks shouldn't ignore blockchain
      3. But why should banks even bother?
      4. Banking business lines that can be potentially disrupted
      5. How blockchain can affect lending
    2. Trade finance on the blockchain
    3. Blockchain and insurance
    4. Investment banking and blockchain
    5. Blockchain and financial regulation
    6. Blockchain and the retail sector
      1. The Internet of Things
        1. How is this related to the retail industry?
    7. Blockchain and intellectual property
    8. Blockchain and the food sector
    9. Blockchain and the transportation sector
    10. Blockchain and the global tech giants
      1. Google
        1. How could blockchain disrupt YouTube's dominance?
        2. How could Blockchain disrupt AdSense?
      2. Facebook
        1. How could blockchain disrupt Facebook's business?
      3. Amazon
        1. The impact of blockchain on Amazon Web services
      4. Apple
    11. Summary
  19. Blockchain and AI
    1. A brief history of AI
    2. Implementing AI
    3. Projects combining blockchain and AI
    4. Future of AI for smart contracts
    5. Summary
  20. Current Issues and Potential Solutions to Take Blockchain to the Next Level
    1. Issues faced by blockchain
      1. Scalability
      2. Governance
      3. Interoperability
      4. Privacy
    2. Solutions for scalability issues
    3. On-chain solutions
      1. Proof-of-Stake
      2. Sharding
    4. Off-chain solutions
      1. Payment or state channels
      2. Plasma
      3. Truebit
    5. Solutions to other challenges
    6. Next generation blockchain projects
    7. The exciting world of blockchain
      1. Resemblance to previous disruptive innovations
      2. The technology hype cycle
      3. Blockchain and Web 3.0
    8. Summary
  21. Other Books You may Enjoy
    1. Leave a review - let other readers know what you think

Product information

  • Title: Blockchain for Business 2019
  • Author(s): Peter Lipovyanov
  • Release date: January 2019
  • Publisher(s): Packt Publishing
  • ISBN: 9781789956023