In a YouTube video titled ‘ETFS, patents, Coinbase, and why the folly of ignoring ownership will turn crypto upside down,’ economist and financial analyst Reggie Middleton covered nChain’s massive IP portfolio and speculated as to how this might impact the digital currency industry. All things considered, Middleton concluded that the BSV blockchain may be significantly undervalued.
2024 will be the year IP makes a big difference
Middleton begins by explaining the topic of the video: due diligence, specifically related to patents and IP. He thinks 2024 will be the year these factors make a big difference in the blockchain and digital currency industries. This is the only industry where billions and even tens of billions are allocated with no due diligence related to patents and IP.
Of course, you can’t look into patents in this industry without encountering Dr. Craig Wright and nChain. They have lots of capital, 100s of engineers, and they are prolific, Middleton says. nChain already has 1,000 issued patents, and there are a further 3,900 in the pipeline. All of these are focused on blockchain technology and DLT.
Middleton tells us that nChain will allow BSV blockchain builders and developers access to all this IP. Given this, BSV may be significantly undervalued. A few years back, the token was removed from major exchanges due to an industry conflict with Dr. Craig Wright, specifically related to his copyright registration of the Bitcoin white paper and subsequent enforcement.
Multi-part computing and Coinbase
Zooming in on one particular patent, Middleton notes that nChain has one related to multi-part computing. This involves taking a private key, splitting it, and using a secret to reunite it.
Why is this significant? This is what Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN) uses to secure its cold storage, he says. Given that it is the custodian for eight out of 11 BTC ETFs, you have to wonder if anyone has asked if the company owns the technology it uses to secure coins, Middleton says.
If nChain’s patent covers Coinbase’s technology, it will have serious consequences. If so, Coinbase may be significantly overvalued, or at least the risk/reward may look different.
In any case, with all of this IP, the BSV blockchain could become the de-facto choice for
Bitcoin in the long run. You can’t ignore this and pretend it doesn’t exist, as many in the industry have done for so long.
nChain is the most dominant force in enterprise blockchain
Whatever you think of Dr. Craig Wright, the other players involved in BSV, or the chain itself, there’s no denying that nChain is leaps and bounds ahead of most others regarding
enterprise blockchain IP.
Just take a look at Reggie Middleton’s recent tweet: 75% of all citations to his own patents come from nChain. This firm is truly prolific; in many cases, they’re decades ahead of others in the industry. While ragtag developers are trying to figure out how to scale Ethereum and other broken blockchains, nChain is working on Bitcoins-Certified Addresses and helping scale Bitcoin to millions of transactions per second.
74% of our patent's cites come from @nChainGlobal – a testament to the prolific nature of nChain's IP program.
This makes me think that #BSV may have significantly more value than many are realizing since nChain is stating that BSV users will be licensed through its use. Others… pic.twitter.com/eF5RGBAEYe— Reggie Middleton US11196566, US11895246, JP6813477 (@ReggieMiddleton) March 6, 2024
Here’s the rub: property rights exist in the blockchain industry whether anarchists or idealists like it or not. Ignoring them will have serious consequences, and in 2024 and beyond, they’ll become more important to how the industry progresses and develops. In no other sector is this laissez-faire attitude to IP displayed, and many are in for a rude awakening.
As Dr. Wright proves his identity as Satoshi Nakamoto and begins to enforce his IP rights over the Bitcoin database, and as nChain starts to flex its muscles and wield its massive IP portfolio, things could quickly change for the better. Undoubtedly, the BSV blockchain ecosystem will get a boost when the dust settles. Middleton is right to speculate that the entire BSV blockchain ecosystem is probably significantly undervalued.
Watch: Web3 will change our lives, nChain CIO Christine Leong explains how
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