CoinDesk’s Q1 2016 State of Blockchain report summarizes key trends, data and events from the first quarter of 2016.
This article highlights a few of the 100 new slides from the report, which is freely available to view in full here. For more of our quarterly and annual reports, visit CoinDesk Research .
As blockchain hype begins to subside and entrepreneurs and organizations get down to the business of implementation and execution, a new debate has emerged over timing.
Splitting industry observers is a key question – Are we just short distance (1-2 years) away from witnessing the radical, transformative effects of blockchain technology? Or is five to 10 years a more realistic timeframe before blockchain technology fully matures and achieves wide adoption?
Nearly two-and-a-half years have now passed since Marc Andreessen penned a widely referenced New York Times op-ed about how bitcoin reminded him of the Internet circa 1993. His forecast suggested that it would be only a few short years before the blockchain-equivalent of Web 1.0 world-beating companies like Cisco would emerge.
In contrast, a string of voices, ranging from author and consultant Chris Skinner to financial institutions such as Morgan Stanley, have suggested that blockchain maturity and adoption is likely to take much longer than Andreessen’s forecast.
In other words (and to stay with the Internet analogy), the skeptics would say blockchain adoption is actually closer to 1970s-80s Internet time, when foundational protocols like TCP/IP were invented, rather early-1990s Internet time.
Who’s correct in this debate remains to be seen, but the stakes are incredibly high for an industry with over $1bn in venture capital investment.Amidst this backdrop, we review some key trends from the quarter that was: Venture bounce back As of Q1 2016, total venture capital investment in bitcoin and blockchain startups now exceeds $1.1bn.Perhaps more importantly, Q1 […]
