Blockchain And The Future Of ERPs
Since its inception, enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems have been a high-level asset to businesses, by providing automated business processes within an enterprise. Most businesses operate within a network of partners and vendors, and with the economy becoming more integrated, the need for cross-company collaboration continuously grows. But there aren’t many ERPs today that offer a fully comprehensive set of solutions for automating external business process. Yes, there are workarounds and third party sources, but none yet fully integrated in ERP systems. This is where blockchain technology has found an opportunity. Incorporating blockchain technology into ERP products allows business partners in your network to store their own copies of digitally signed transactions. Dimitri Tyles, senior director of engineering at Deltek explains the importance of blockchain and the future of ERP systems.
- It’s All About Trust – mutual agreement with sensitivity of data for all parties.
- What About Digital Signatures? – digital signing is generally built around documents, but doesn’t provide the necessary user experience if we need to sign transactions in an ERP. However, you can workaround it with an unrelated technology — FIDO (fast ID online) or Web Authentication to digitally sign any business transaction.
- Why Blockchain? – While a digitally signed transaction can’t be altered without detection, it can still be deleted without a trace. Enterprise blockchains gives each participant their own node and stores their own copy of all signed transactions.
What we need is for ERP vendors to deliver blockchain-based solutions as SaaS offerings with all the additional tools provided as part of an ERP “all-in-one” system.
