The United States coffeehouse chain Starbucks is one of the most mainstream companies to look into crypto, and its intentions have finally been confirmed this week: The company has teamed up with Microsoft to track its beans with a blockchain. Moreover, reports say that the coffee giant might start accepting bitcoin (BTC) payments in its U.S. branches later this year. So, is the long-awaited mainstream adoption finally coming to the crypto market? As many mainstream companies, Starbucks leans toward the “blockchain before bitcoin” approach Starbucks’ relationship with crypto could be traced back to January 2018, when its executive chairman and …
Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com has applied for over 200 blockchain patents, according to a report by Securities Daily News on May 20. The report also notes that major e-commerce competitor Alibaba has applied for 262 blockchain patents, and Chinese internet titans Tencent and Baidu have applied for 80 and 50 such patents, respectively, as recorded by the Intellectual Property Center of China Information and Communication. According to interpretation of the data provided by Intellectual Property Center of China Information and Communication, JD.com was in first place for “global blockchain patent strength,” with Alibaba, Tencent, and Baidu coming it at second, …
The Japanese arm of computer giant Microsoft has partnered with nascent blockchain startup LayerX to “accelerate” uptake of the technology, Cointelegraph Japan reported Nov. 30. LayerX, which formed in August as a joint venture from news curation app Gunosy and advisory service AnyPay, oversees blockchain integration for enterprise, including areas such as smart contracts and general consulting. Using Microsoft’s Azure Blockchain-as-a-Service (BaaS) solution, the companies will seek to promote the technology further in the domestic economy. “We will support the introduction process in its entirety, even down to technical support of finished implementations,” an accompanying press release stated, adding: “Both …
China will lead an international research group on the standardization of the Internet of Things (IoT) and blockchain technology, local news outlet Science and Technology Daily reports July 18. The joint technical committee of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) have adopted the proposal for the creation of this international research group after a month of a discussion by committee members. Science and Technology Daily, the official newspaper of the Ministry of Science and Technology of China, writes that the creation of this group means China has won “discourse power” in technology integration: “It …
Yesterday IOTA announced a major platform release allowing data monetization using micropayments through their distributed ledger technology. The data solution has already garnered huge partnerships from Microsoft, Fujitsu, Bosch, Deutsche Bank Telekom, and others. IOTA has already issued its tokens of the same name under their token sale earlier this fall. The company has created what it considers a better option in Blockchain technology evolution called ‘tangle.’ Through this system, the company is creating a way for connected devices to be able to transfer, buy and sell diverse datasets while creating access to data that often sits unused, all with …