nChain is the London-based research powerhouse behind Bitcoin SV (BSV). Its mission is to “ignite global adoption and enterprise-level usage of Bitcoin.” To make that happen, nChain has set up a professional services unit to reach out to businesses and encourage them to design and implement blockchain projects, with Osmin Callis as its Business Development Manager.
While the company’s engineering team are responsible for developing the node software for BSV and the additional components that would allow businesses to connect to its blockchain, the research department develops nChain’s intellectual property portfolio—which is probably the largest in the world for open blockchain, Osmin says.
Then Osmin’s professional services team take the research output to work with businesses, commercialising the company’s intellectual property portfolio. “We have this treasure trove of ideas, of possible future applications,” Osmin says, “Things which are disruptive, which change the way we understand areas of technology that we take for granted today.”
When working with businesses, Osmin says, they have learnt to go easy on the tech discussions: “Experience has shown us that it’s of less value to talk about some of the more granular features of the technology in front of someone’s who’s responsible for making business decisions. It’s really about making sure the message fits the audience.”
Osmin says that nChain is in it for “the long game” and so while a meeting may not immediately result in a project, “Hopefully it’s contributed to the betterment of the ecosystem. If we’re too aggressive in trying to capture market share, it’s not necessarily to the benefit of all.”
One piece of conventional wisdom that nChain fights against it the idea that private blockchains are appropriate for enterprise while public blockchains are best for government or other entities. But “it’s really not as straightforward as that,” Osmin says. nChain believes BSV is always the best solution and the idea that enterprises can take “baby steps” by embarking on a private blockchain project may prove to be a waste of time and money. “In the long term, we know we’re all going to end up connecting on the same medium—the same blockchain.”
One advantage for a business of moving straight to the public blockchain is that if it wants to move from data to payments, then the currency aspect is already built into BSV, instead of having to be “bolted on” to a private blockchain.
In the immediate future, Osmin’s team is focussing on two sectors: financial services and online gaming—whether gambling or platform games. In financial services, “we’ve been getting a lot of interest from central banks” in Europe and West Africa. Some of these have “expressed a significant interest in the possibility of creating their own digital currency, using a base currency such as Bitcoin SV.” With a system utilising their own protocol on BSV, a bank would be able to control the money supply “in exactly the same way as they would do today.”
If this all goes according to plan, nChain will be contributing to fostering and promoting global trade. “The ramifications …are many and varied and I think it’s exciting because we have yet to discover what all of those things will be and what it’ll bring.”
Hear the full interview with Osmin Callis on this week’s CoinGeek Conversations podcast:
You can also watch the podcast video on YouTube.
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