BSVA Gartner IT Symposium: Enterprises shift to ‘buy vs. build’

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When I was working for Everest Poker in the mid-late 00’s, my manager religiously attended at least one conference outside of the online gambling industry per year. By doing so, he was able to obtain fresh perspectives on challenges every industry faces, inspiring new ideas and innovation within ours.

When I heard about the BSV Association (BSVA) ‘s attendance at the Gartner IT Symposium 2024, I was reminded of this best practice from nearly 20 years ago and spoke with BSVA attendees Frank Dickob and Martin Coxall to see what fresh perspectives they obtained for the BSV ecosystem.

When asked why they find value in attending future tech events outside the scope of the blockchain space specifically, Coxall said the companies that attend these IT conferences are the future enterprise users of the blockchain of tomorrow, a key focus of the BSVA.

“They need blockchain to solve issues they have not yet identified. A good example here is how to scale AI use in a durable fashion beyond the initial hype,” Coxall shared with me. 

Dickob echoed Coxall’s sentiments and said it’s critical for the BSVA to understand the real day-to-day challenges of enterprise tech executives and managers and what they are exploring in order to solve these challenges. 

Dickob said the Gartner event, in particular, provided an open forum to gain condensed, systematic insights from hundreds of companies while providing a “safe” space for participants to discuss and exchange perspectives rather than focusing on buying or selling.

The dominant theme at the event was undoubtedly artificial intelligence (AI), particularly how and where to implement, operate, and govern operational AI. Dickob mentioned the interest in Agentic AI, with AI operating as virtual employees along entire workflows.

The powerful combination of AI and a scalable blockchain such as BSV is a huge focus of the BSVA, although enterprise-level professionals often ignore this area, as reflected at the Symposium. 

Coxall said the Gartner event was focused on CTOs and CIOs who pilot the strategic direction and tech choices companies take over the coming decades, the perfect professionals to educate on the AI-blockchain partnership.

“AI and blockchain are perfect complements in many areas such as data authenticity, integrity, time stamped and tamper proof along fast and efficient processing,” Dickob pointed out.

“It is our job to share, educate on, promote an integrated holistic perspective on applying AI underpinned by enterprise-grade, fast, secure, and operationally scalable blockchain,” he said.

Currently, across almost every industry, the interest in future tech has shifted to a complete focus on AI, even if blockchain is there as the plumbing in the background.

According to Coxall, as expected, the 7,000 attendees at the Gartner Symposium were indeed almost completely focused on AI. He said even companies that use blockchain as part of their tech stack have pivoted their messaging to focus on their use of AI, even when it’s only a superficial use.

Another underlying industry trend in enterprise tech remains the increasing share of buy vs. build, Dickob observed at the symposium.

“Companies are ever more looking to mostly buy platform-based solutions and services and customize/build to distinctly smaller percentage, something for our ecosystem companies to consider in their strategies,” he advised.

Seeing as enterprise-level professionals are laser-focused on AI at present, platform developers may find it useful to lead with AI vs. blockchain, even if they are building blockchain-based solutions for the use of AI. 

As ethical AI takes center stage, I believe blockchain’s role in keeping AI in check will become more mainstream, and the two technologies will eventually be regarded as partners by everyone. 

In order for artificial intelligence (AI) to work right within the law and thrive in the face of growing challenges, it needs to integrate an enterprise blockchain system that ensures data input quality and ownership—allowing it to keep data safe while also guaranteeing the immutability of data. Check out CoinGeek’s coverage on this emerging tech to learn more why Enterprise blockchain will be the backbone of AI.

Watch: Onboarding enterprises onto BSV blockchain via AWS