Technology Giants Intel and SAP Team Up to Develop Enterprise Blockchain Solutions
World famous chip maker, Intel and SAP have joined forces to develop enterprise blockchain solutions to address “gaps in the market”, and potentially become a direct competitor to the Linux Foundation’s Hyperledger and R3’s Corda.
According to a post on Intel’s website, the technology giant has teamed up with SAP, the German-based multinational software corporation, to find solutions that power enterprise blockchain systems for easier integration and adoption. Tim Allen, a strategic relationship manager at Intel wrote:
“SAP and Intel’s co-development efforts are geared toward creating superior blockchain technologies and integrating them with new and existing business applications”
With a well established relationship, Intel and SAP have worked together on various enterprise infrastructure platforms over the last 25 years, including the SAP HANA Data Management System, which recently expanded to include Blockchain as a Service (BaaS), with interoperable ‘pay-as-you-go’ features for its enterprise customers.
As a major service provider to some of the worlds largest organisations, SAP undertook a survey of its clients to publish “Blockchain: A Study Rooted in Reality”, the results were a catalyst for the creation of an SAP-led global industry blockchain consortium, its website states:
“SAP is bringing likeminded industry leaders and the companies they do business with together to facilitate requirement definitions for some of the biggest business challenges – turning blockchain to reality”
The blockchain consortium was formed in June with seven founding members including Intel, Hewlett Packard (HP), US multinational delivery company UPS, Airbus’s California subsidiary A3, US electronic manufacturer Flex, and Arizona-based service provider Amkor Technology to research into enterprise blockchain solutions.
The Intel website post goes on to outline a blockchain-based supply chain management proof-of-concept solution entitled ‘International Trade’, and in-depth studies of blockchain metrics with aim of resolving slow throughput issues.
Intel states that its processor technology has the ability to offer the capacity and speed to facilitate a range of blockchain applications. Furthermore, it claims that its Software Guard Extensions (Intel SGX) can enhance security for blockchain source code and data, which could “improve throughput and consensus efficiency.”
The duo have already successfully developed the SAP HANA Blockchain adapter for interoperable integration with the recently launched SAP Cloud Blockchain Platform, enabling customers to use their traditional SQL interface to add and consume data, “both on-premise or in the cloud”.
Both Intel and SAP are prevalent within the blockchain industry, working closely with blockchain technology startup companies. Back in 2016, Intel developed Hyperledger Sawtooth Lake to process the secure transfer of digital assets for large-scale commercial enterprises and organisations, and was included in the launch of Microsoft Azure’s blockchain platform.