IBM's Blockchain-Inspired Project Moves Forward Without Leader

The man leading a blockchain-based Internet of Things project at IBM is now leaving his position at the company, according to Gigaom. But don't panic, the compelling project will live on without him.

To back up a bit, the Internet of Things is connecting everyday items to the Internet, from cars to toasters. Smartphones are not the end-all for the Internet, as the argument goes. Paul Brody, VP and North American Leader of the Internet of Things for IBM, originally proposed building an Internet of Things platform proof-of-concept called Adept.

The blockchain's role in the platform is to track the relationships between the devices that are talking to each other. The project requires an interesting mix of software materials: Brody proposed combining Ethereum blockchain, BitTorrent technology, and Telehash to make it work. Gigaom contributor, Stacey Higginbotham, discussed the details of the project with Brody in a podcast back in September.

But even as Brody moves on to the next project (whatever that may be), Adept is still chugging along. IBM, including Brody, already showcased a working product at CES 2015 last week. They showed a washing machine that would order its own detergent. But this is one small example, and “scalable version of the architecture” is on the way in four to six weeks, according to Gigaom.

The whole idea behind the framework is that it could potentially provide a cheaper and more scalable architecture for the Internet of Things.

IBM fellow John Cohn and global electronics lead, Veena Pureswaran, will continue the work in Brody's absence. With Brody, Pureswaran co-authored the paper Device Democracy: Saving the Future of the Internet of Things, which takes another look at how the Internet of Things could work in a democratic way—with the help of Bitcoin.

The white paper for the project is not yet available, but Higginbotham says to keep an eye out for Adept on Github. They will soon post the white paper for the proof-of-concept, as demonstrated at CES 2015.

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