So, you are a business owner, a maker, an independent services provider or something else in between? And you are having a rough time, with no access to the market, some company taking some big cut from you by using their services or you are facing fierce competition from the big guy?
This might give you a light at the end of the tunnel. Have faith.
The background
Sometimes ago, I was exploring what kind of education system needed to be related to what world my kids will face in the future. In order to do so, I began to map the shift that I think will happen to the business world of the future.
Then, since I’m following the blockchain ecosystem quite close lately, it is natural for me to see it from a blockchain perspective. I began to draw how the blockchain works and how it will change the way we do business, how the blockchain will change our relationship with others in person or business manner and how the blockchain will change the way we acquired our needs in the future.
I hope that from the pattern, I can predict what kind of work (or jobs) is available for my kids in the future, and prepare their education related to the shift.
But the result is quite interesting to me and I think it is worth sharing. I manage to draw how we as people or as a business will interact with others whenever they are our customers or our business partners, and how we acquired goods and services in the future.
I am using Gojek as an example. If you don’t know Gojek, it is a ride-sharing platform (with many other services served on top of it). It is one of Indonesia’s first unicorn startups with many big guys like Google, Tencent and Sequoia Capital now investing in them.
The present-time Gojek model
What do they do? Basically, Gojek is a localised version of Uber with a twist. It is an app-based ride-hailing/sharing service. But when Uber focuses on cars, Gojek focuses more on motorcycle taxis than cars (although they offer car rides too).
And again, just like Uber, they don’t have any cars or motorcycles. The car and motorcycle are owned by independent drivers and riders.
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Today, Gojek has grown and offered many services on top of the driver and rider partners community they’d built. Services from food delivery, massage, house cleaning, and moving services to payment systems are now available in their app.
Ok, let’s go deeper and see how this will change.
Imagine that you have a motorcycle, and you run your personal motorcycle taxi services, which we call Ojek in Indonesia (Ojek — Gojek, can you see the rhyme here).
We will see your market reach, as an independent motorcycle taxi provider in the past before Gojek, present-day with Gojek and in the future when Gojek (as the middleman) is no longer needed and is replaced by blockchain technology.
The graphic is built to find where the value is in the future and hopefully will reflect valuable future jobs for my kids
In the past, as an Ojek, a motorcycle taxi provider, your market is limited. Your pattern is every day, you wait near a neighbourhood, a market or where people are gathered. If someone needs your services, they will look to you and come to you.
Your market reach is as long as your eyesight. It is small and limited in both reach and what kind of services you can offer.
Now, with Gojek, when someone needs your services, they will open the Gojek app, all you have to do is tap on the app to get the order. Your reach is now wider than eyesight, as long as you are within range of Gojek time to customer algorithm (at least that’s what I think). And, you can even offer different services now, like delivering food, movie ticket or package.
But, as a middleman, Gojek is stood between you and your market. You need them, your customer needs them. They also have or take a bigger value than you. I mean, let’s say that your revenue for each day is around USD 20. Gojek in the meantime is valued at US$3 billion (January 2018) according to Techcrunch. Ok, I know that revenue is different than valuation, but I think you’ve got my point.
What about in the future, when blockchain rules and run everything?
The future with blockchain
One of the promises of the blockchain is, it can provide an infrastructure that enables direct connection between the party. It can be communication, transaction or else. No more middleman needed.
What happens to you now as an Ojek, as a motorcycle taxi provider?
With blockchain technology, you won’t need Gojek anymore. Just like in the past, you will reach your customer directly, but you will have the same wider market you can grab as big as when you use Gojek services.
How is that possible? How can I reach my customer if Gojek is not present? Or will it just be another middleman, but not Gojek?
Let’s see the graphics above, the future part. I think in the future, with blockchain, instead of close, monolithic, vertical integration services owned by one company, a direct connection will be provided by an infrastructure builder and maybe an analytics services provider.
This infrastructure builder is the startup of the future. In the present time, what Gojek do is develop a closed proprietary system where you and I have to enter, harvest our data, process for their benefit and take a big chunk of the value of the ecosystem.
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In the future, the infrastructure builder approach is to build a connection point and smart contract for setting up the transaction for you on top of the public blockchain platform like Ethereum for example.
If you want to use this infrastructure, you will need to pay them (you pay for the computation power used), just like a toll road/paid highway. But the payment is done directly from your customer to you, triggered by a real-time forcible autonomous smart contract. No human is needed, and no company dictated your income. Is all seamless, autonomous done by a smart contract algorithm, again running on top of the blockchain?
Also, the data you generate now can be yours. They say data is the new oil, very valuable and very powerful. In the blockchain future, you can even monetise it by selling your data for some money. With a platform like Streamr, now, we can buy, sell and analyse data.
The difference when you use the current service provider is, first their system decided who can take the order, and they decide the price and how much you can take, in some cases, the payment goes through their payment system, and you’ll get your money later.
And don’t forget, they now possess your valuable data which can be monetised further, and you give it to them for free.
This is how we will interact with our customers of other businesses in the future. It will be a direct connection from you to others through an open infrastructure that is able autonomously to set up a business contract, condition, agreement, and payment for you.
And that can be applied to many things and works both ways (you as a provider or as a customer), from property rent (like Airbnb), buying goods or services to investment, you name it.
If you are a positive thinker, there are many opportunities in this model. But one thing, the business model has to change for sure, you need to find where the value is.
The article was published on the author’s Medium.
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