In an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph, Ethereum Co-Founder Vitalik Buterin reveals some of the many exciting applications being developed by banks, startups and corporations within the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance and shared the development roadmap of Ethereum for 2017.
Corporations interest
On March 13, Cointelegraph attributed the recent all-time high Ethereum price to the Ethereum Foundation’s partnership strategy success. The introduction of the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA), formed by it, spurred the interests of global large corporations.
Since then, startups and corporations within the EEA have been developing exciting applications on top of the Ethereum Blockchain and framework. In an interview, Buterin reveals to Cointelegraph some of these projects:
“Many of them [the companies in EEA] are developing applications. There is a company in Taiwan which is working on Ethereum consortium chain-based payment solution and several other Blockchain applications they are using to record data from triathlons for example. They have already been making quite a lot of progress in talking to regulators and trying to move something forward to the mainstream audience.”
Recently, Buterin visited the Taiwan Blockchain and Ethereum meetup to discuss some of the projects of the Ethereum Foundation and Ethereum’s development roadmap for the year 2017.
DApp for BHP Billiton
Furthermore, Buterin revealed that the $92 bln mining, metals and petroleum corporation BHP Billiton is currently building an application on top of Ethereum to track natural resources. He explained that BHP Billiton is already running tests of their application and seeing great success.
“The startups involved in the EEA are actively developing applications. As far as the larger corporate members, there definitely are some that have been developing actively. UBS have been doing experiments on Ethereum since 2015. BNY Mellon is a part of the consortium. There is BHP Billiton using Ethereum in a test for tracking natural resources. There are already many companies moving forward.”
As Buterin mentioned, it is likely that startups within the EEA will collaborate with larger corporations in the foreseeable future. Companies like UBS are working with local Blockchain and Ethereum startups in London to demonstrate the potential of Ethereum in the finance industry.
From PoW to PoS
The migration of Ethereum from its current Proof of Work consensus protocol to Proof of Stake has been a highly anticipated discussion within the Ethereum community. Buterin explained that the first stage of PoS development is close to completion and some parts of it are currently being tested.
If the plans of the Ethereum Foundation are pursued as planned, Buterin expects a full migration from PoW to PoS in the next one to two years.
“I expect [Proof of Stake] to be finished in the next one or two years. We plan to do a transition from Proof of Work to Proof of Stake in several steps. The first step is close to being finished and is starting to be tested now. We’ve already done a lot of work in making sure the algorithms are correct and formally verified. We’re planning to start implementing the first stage very soon and, depending on how quickly that goes, then move on to Proof of Stake over time.”