Blockchain network model to improve supply chain vsibility based on smart contract

Abstract—Due to the increasing complexity of supply chains over the past years, many factors significantly contribute to lowering the supply chains performance. Poor visibility is one of the major challenging factors that lowers supply chains performance. This paper proposes a Blockchain-based supply chain network model to improve the supply chain visibility. The model focuses in improving the visibility measurements properties: information sharing, traceability, and inventory visibility. The proposed model consists of information sharing, traceability, and inventory visibility platforms based on Blockchain technology smart contract. The model built with Hyperledger platform and extend the Hyperledger Composer Supply Chain Network (HCSC) model. The research is designed to three main phases. First phase: the preliminary phase which is the literature review phase to identify the existing challenges in the domain. The second phase: the design and implementation phase which is the development steps of the proposed research model. The third phase: the evaluation phase which represent the performance evaluation of the proposed model and the comparisons between the proposed model and the existing models. In the evaluation performance, the common performance metrics Lead time and average inventory levels will be compared in the proposed model, Cloud-based information system, and the traditional supply chain. These proposed platforms offer an end-to-end visibility of products, orders, and stock levels for supply chain practitioners and customers within supply chain networks. Which helps managers’ access key information that support critical business decisions and offers essential criteria for competitiveness and therefore, enhance supply chain performance

A High-Performance Hybrid Blockchain System for Traceable IoT Applications

© 2019, Springer Nature Switzerland AG. Blockchain, as an immutable distributed ledger, can be the key to realize secure and trustworthy IoT applications. However, existing blockchains can hardly achieve high-performance and high-security for large-scale IoT applications simultaneously. In this paper, we propose a hyper blockchain architecture combining the security of public blockchains with the efficiency of private blockchains. An IoT anchoring smart contract is proposed to anchor private IoT blockchains into a public blockchain. An IoT device management smart contract is also designed to trace sensory data. A comprehensive analysis reveals that the proposed hybrid blockchain system can achieve the performance of private blockchains and resist tampering

Digitalizing Circular Economy through Blockchains: The Blockchain Circular Economy Index

The integration of circular economy (CE) models into everyday contexts generates huge amount of data involved in goods tracking and tokenization procedures. The sector of blockchain platforms is extremely varied, and the choice of the proper technology is not easy. It is important that the selection is conducted consistently with respect to the CE models. With this study, we present a performance index named Blockchain Circular Economy Index (BCEI). BCEI, obtained through Multicriteria Decision Analysis and Analytic Hierarchy Process, aims to measure the suitability of blockchain platforms to the needs highlighted by a CE scenario. The present study is contextualized by comparing six blockchain platforms, for each of which, the related BCEI is calculated. The results of the analysis show that transaction fee and energy consumption are the two most critical parameters. In addition, the results show the lack of a leading blockchain technology in CE models. Thus, there is a market space that can be exploited given the growing interest in digital and sustainable issues

Digitalizing Circular Economy through Blockchains: The Blockchain Circular Economy Index

The integration of circular economy (CE) models into everyday contexts generates huge amount of data involved in goods tracking and tokenization procedures. The sector of blockchain platforms is extremely varied, and the choice of the proper technology is not easy. It is important that the selection is conducted consistently with respect to the CE models. With this study, we present a performance index named Blockchain Circular Economy Index (BCEI). BCEI, obtained through Multicriteria Decision Analysis and Analytic Hierarchy Process, aims to measure the suitability of blockchain platforms to the needs highlighted by a CE scenario. The present study is contextualized by comparing six blockchain platforms, for each of which, the related BCEI is calculated. The results of the analysis show that transaction fee and energy consumption are the two most critical parameters. In addition, the results show the lack of a leading blockchain technology in CE models. Thus, there is a market space that can be exploited given the growing interest in digital and sustainable issues

The enhanced model of hyperledger composer supply chain (hcsc) for the product environmental in supply chain networks

Blockchain technology has received growing attention over the years. Recently, many blockchain-based models have been proposed to improve the issues of poor visibility in supply chains. However, due to the expansions and complexity in the operations of supply chains in the last few years, poor visibility is still one of the major challenges that lower the performance of supply chains. Besides, the existing blockchain models have key limitations in the common visibility measurements properties (VMP): information sharing, traceability, and inventory visibility such as a lack of identifying products based on environmental attributes to identify the green products. Still, there is a need to eliminate the time consumption in the current traceability systems. Current models share basic inventory information including inventory level and demand forecasts. Model HCSC is one of the important blockchain-based models that addressed information sharing and traceability; however, it lacks a feature of identifying product environmental attributes to know the green products, lacks a fast batch tracking of product storage temperature and expired products, and lacks visibility of inventory with less inventory cost by modelling safety stock and reorder points. Thus, this study proposes a Hyperledger composer supply chain products orders Stock (HCSC-POS) model based on the HCSC model to share product environmental sustainability attributes to the blockchain network in the identification of green products to control the environmental impact of production and improve the environmental sustainability. The proposed model enhances traceability by fast batch tracking of the product storage temperature and expired products for fast identification and recalling defective orders to reduce time consumption in product recalls. Additionally, it enhances the visibility of inventory with less cost by modelling safety stock and reorder points. The development of the proposed model consists of three main steps: 1-Extending the HCSC data model, 2- Developing the enhancements of the Blockchain Hyperledger Composer framework, and 3-Testing the proposed enhancements in the Hyperledger Composer execution runtime environment. To evaluate the proposed model, experimental test scenarios were conducted to evaluate traceability and inventory visibility enhancements in terms of time effectiveness and efficiency using real industry data from the manufacturing industry. The results show accessibility and availability of product environmental sustainability attributes with “environmentally friendly product” labels in the blockchain network. The model enhances the traceability of batches with less consumption time of about 89.47% better than other existing models in time responsiveness. In the inventory visibility, model HCSC-POS efficiency in terms of inventory costs showed about 60.48% reduction which was better than other models. These results offer the supply chain industry a competitive advantage in terms of environmental sustainability, fast batch traceability, and increased inventory visibility with less inventory cost by modelling safety stock and reorder points. This end-to-end visibility helps in the accurate business decision-making process and improves supply chain performance

Why, Where, and How are Organizations Using Blockchain in their Supply Chains? Motivations, Application areas, and Contingency Factors

Purpose Blockchain is increasingly being considered for deployment in operations and supply chain management. However, evidence from practice is still scarce on why, where, and how organizations seek to apply the technology in the supply chain across different industries. The study develops a comprehensive framework to enhance understanding of the application areas of blockchain technology in the supply chain, as well as organizations’ motivations in seeking blockchain solutions and relevant contingency factors influencing applications.Design/methodology/approachWe investigate 50 use cases of blockchain applications in the supply chain, covering six industries. We apply contingency theory and conduct a detailed qualitative textual and correlation analysis to identify and compare blockchain adoption motivations, application areas and contingency factors across the different sectors. FindingsThe analysis develops an evidence-based framework that captures ten principal motivations in seeking blockchain solutions, three main blockchain application areas along with important application sub-categories, and five clusters of contingency factors that determine blockchain deployment and its success in different industrial sectors.Research implications The study expands the limited cross-sectoral research on blockchain applications and motivations in the supply chain. Using contingency theory, we present a comprehensive framework that captures the drivers and factors relating to blockchain adoption in the supply chain in a nomological network. The study lays the foundation for further theoretical perspectives and empirical research to investigate relevant sectoral characteristics and their importance for different types of blockchain applications in the supply chain.Practical implications The study informs practitioners about potential supply chain application areas that can be enhanced through blockchain technology, taking account of the specific characteristics of their product, business and manufacturing processes, supply network configuration, industry standards, regulations, and market demand.Originality/valueThe study is the first to provide cross-sectoral evidence on the relevance of organizations’ motivations and numerous contingency factors on blockchain application areas in the supply chain

BlockNet Report: Exploring the Blockchain Skills Concept and Best Practice Use Cases

In order to explore the practical potential and needs of interdisciplinary knowledge and competence requirements of Blockchain technology, the project activity "Development of Interdisciplinary Blockchain Skills Concept" starts with the literature review identifying the state of the art of Blockchain in Supply Chain Management and Logistics, Business and Finance, as well as Computer Science and IT-Security. The project activity further explores the academic and industry landscape of existing initiatives in education which offer Blockchain courses. Moreover, job descriptions and adverts are analyzed in order to specify today's competence requirements from enterprises. To discuss and define the future required competence, expert workshops are organized to validate the findings by academic experts. Based on the research outcome and validation, an interdisciplinary approach for Blockchain competence is developed. A second part focuses on the development of the Blockchain Best Practices activity while conducting qualitative empirical research based on case studies with industry representatives. Therefore, company interviews, based on the theoretical basis of Output 1, explore existing Blockchain use cases in different sectors. Due to the interdisciplinary importance of Blockchain technology, these skills will be defined by different perspectives of Blockchain from across multiple mentioned disciplines. The use cases and companies for the interviews will be selected based on various sampling criteria to gain results valid for a broad scale. The analysis of the various use cases will be conducted and defined in a standardized format to identify the key drivers and competence requirements for Blockchain technology applications and their adoption. On the one hand, this approach ensures comparability, on the other hand, it facilitates the development of a structured and systematic framework.Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:2102.0322