AERGO CEO Phil Zamani: ‘Investors Seeking Adoption Platforms’ [Interview]

These platforms are generally aiming to offer specified business solutions that will move blockchain technology to the masses. One such platform is AERGO, a spin-off from South Korea-based Blocko. The company has created a not-for-profit platform where businesses are able to tailor blockchain solutions to meet their exact needs without breaking the bank. BeInCrypto sat down with the CEO of both AERGO and of the board at Blocko, Phil Zamani, to get his take on where the blockchain industry is moving in the coming years.

We’ve recently heard the news that Aergo received another substantial influx of investment funds. What do you think is causing investors to move toward blockchain technology for enterprise IT solutions?

We’ve increasingly seen more demand for projects in this area from enterprise, fintech, and public services companies — especially in Korea, which just ranked as one of the most innovative countries in the world. This created significant token-purchase interest in the project. Most blockchain investments over the course of 2017 and 2018 were made into platforms or startups building consumer-focused applications. These were things like decentralized real estate payment platforms or decentralized AirBnBs. With many of these platforms not seeing much traction — particularly due to the extreme friction involved when using blockchain technology in its current state) — investors are looking into solutions for IT backends that can be integrated through consulting services and don’t suffer the harsh pitfalls of user experience. In this way they’re more likely to see fundamental adoption. [bctt tweet=”Investors are looking into solutions for IT backends that can be integrated through consulting services and don’t suffer the harsh pitfalls of user experience. In this way they’re more likely to see fundamental adoption.” username=”beincrypto”]

How have you seen blockchain technology implementations mature through your time developing the platform?

We’ve seen some more interesting projects emerge that are taking new approaches to innovation by innovating layer-two, the service layer, or even lower levels of the OSI stack — as opposed to simply the consensus algorithm as we saw in 2017 and 2018. Some include:

• Coda, which uses zero-knowledge proof cryptography to make blockchains the size of a tweet
• Marconi, which creates blockchains as a data and communication structure as an Ethernet protocol based on smart contracts
• Thunder, which uses PBFT atop Ethereum to accelerate transaction speeds
• bloXroute, which creates a block propagation network underneath blockchains
• Many other projects using trusted hardware to perform private computations.

This is all good news for the technology on a small scale, but do you see substantial concerns regarding adoption by enterprise-level clients?

Regulatory uncertainty around blockchain is the greatest concern most have. Cloud implementations like ours have to take data privacy and financial regulation laws into account. Often times, we run into significant hurdles when working with clients. Many of our customers in South Korea don’t wish to publicize our work with them due to the lack of clarity from the government on their stance regarding blockchain technology in IT.

Is that why you chose Hong Kong as a base of operations — as opposed to Korea, where Blocko is located?

We believe Hong Kong is the right jurisdiction to establish ourselves as a global not-for-profit organization that acts as an open-source software foundation — as opposed to South Korea.

In terms of the overall cryptocurrency market space, where do you see the industry moving in terms of governmental regulation and oversight? Is there reason to fear?

Regulators should be getting more clear on their stances regarding cryptocurrency and blockchain technology in the near future. Once that happens, everyone will be able to really take action and stop sitting on the sidelines waiting for more clarity. This includes both traders, or investors, and enterprise companies looking to implement this technology in their IT systems. What do you think? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!