Digital Currencies and Blockchain

Good evening, everyone.

Sunil. Can we start the session?

Yes, go ahead. Yeah.

So a warm welcome to everyone. Thank you for joining in for today's session. My name is Susan Thomas. Their visitors development at talentsprint are short. For myself. I have over nine years of experience in helping professionals graduates and engineers render towards taking better career decisions and upskill. Prior to talentsprint, I had also worked with Indian School of Business and works in school of business. So I would not waste much of my time here. So with me, I have Sunil Agarwal, Sunil Agarwal is the lead faculty, for our people ideas about blockchain and distributed ledger technologies program. I would just say a few words about Sunil as an introduction. So Neil is a leading blockchain expert and has been advising startups and Icos for over six years now has almost two decades of experience in teaching research and startup consulting. So that's really a very short introduction for Sunil. Sunil, I would request you to take it forward from here. And let's just get started for the session. And you can just give us a brief about yourself here.

Okay. Thank you, Susan. Friends. I've been in this ecosystem for last eight years, particularly blockchain ecosystem since early 2012. And now, in another month, I will be completing nine years in this ecosystem. And since 2016, January 2016, I've been actively involved in blockchain teaching. And since October 2018, I've been part of India's first blockchain executive program. And since then, this program is continuously going on. But today, I would not like to speak about myself. I would like to speak about the program, as well as the theme under discussion, which is digital currencies and blockchain. See, the fact here is that you might have a very obvious question in the beginning that if I'm choosing a topic, like digital currencies and blockchain, then First of all, this might look like a FinTech kind of a choice and why I'm using FinTech and blockchain together. And if this course is about blockchain and distributed ledger technology, then I should have chosen a developer centric topic or developer centric team. See, the fact here is that this program is all about blockchain. But it doesn't mean that you have to know coding in this program or prior knowledge of coding is important to join this particular program. If you ask me that, whether I know coding To be honest, I have no background of coding, I am basically a social sciences expert. And I have learned a lot of blockchain knowledge in a completely self taught manner. I started learning about Bitcoin in early 2012, when there were hardly any resources. So in that sense, my book also is India's first book, I would say that this is first comprehensive blockchain textbook coming from India. So if a person like me, who is a completely self taught person, and who has made a place for himself in this particular industry, and at present, I'm running two blockchain projects, I'm head of research for both of them. Apart from that, I've been part of roughly half a dozen different blocks and projects in last four years. So I personally feel that when you are thinking of blockchain, think money, money from an entrepreneurial sense money from a management sense money from a social sciences sense. That's why I chose a topic, digital currencies and blockchain for today's webinar. Now, the issue here is that this entire session, we I will spend roughly 30 minutes in sharing my thoughts and after that, I will spend around 20 to 25 minutes in taking your queries. So, in the meanwhile, I will, I might stop for a couple of minutes midway to attract any question or any comment. Okay, so let's start. See Whenever we discuss currency blockchain, there is one very important thing which is generally ignored by all the lectures on blockchain. And that is,

we don't remember that there was a time when we had systems which were completely different from what we are used to today. And that's where I am. Remember, I'm reminded of what Winston Churchill once said, The longer you can look back, the further you can look forward. So today, I'm going to discuss both the past and since I'm able to understand the past, I will be able to discuss the future. So based upon this fundamental understanding, let's start how money actually turn into the way it is today. The fact is that most of people feel money is a necessary evil in our life, if we are not forced to work nine to six or nine to seven, every day, then our life would be different. So we say it is a necessary evil for majority of the people. But the fact here is that money has never been necessary evil since beginning, there have been some changes because of which it turned into like that. Because when we started building civilizational ecosystem, human exchange in society was very, very important. Everybody had needs,

but everybody could not take care of all those needs on his or her own. So it created a barter system as a natural social reality. But the issue is that your want, and my supply cannot always go inside. So which means double coincidence of wants, is something which is rare. So in order to handle that particular problem, we needed to build something, which was a unit of account for record keeping, if I'm giving you 10 oranges today, and you are supposed to pay me back after two weeks or after two months, then we have to build some sort of a unit of account for that record keeping. And over time, when people build a unit of account, it was almost impossible to to separate unit of account from medium of exchange, this was a very, very common problem, they might have started with shells, stones, or or feathers, or salt or something like this. But over a period of time unit of account became the medium of exchange. And from there, it also turned into a universal price reference as money was used over larger geographies and larger distances and centralized systems came into money. And then unit of account medium of exchange, and universal price reference all merged into one. And that's when money turned into a necessary evil. And today, the actual form of money that we are using is a central bank issued money in a particular geographical distribution, district jurisdiction or in a particular country, central bank acts as a lender of last resort, which means only one authority that is central bank can issue the legal tender of that country. Now, the thing here is that this system is just almost 100 years old, just before that system was not like this. The first central bank the way it is working today, started in 1914, just around the First World War that started in 1940. And the factor is that just before this fact, Central Bank of USA, the prehistory of American central bank was like this, that over 800 currencies were used in mid 19th century. Now you can you can you can ask yourself that. How come a world with 800 currencies suddenly merged into a world with just one currency. But this is a question that I would repeat this in the second half of my discussion, but remember this, that How come a world with two 800 currencies merge into one historical change happened and the issue behind this was in those days people used to issue currencies. We Were actually not currencies, what what were they were called bills of exchange. So, which in India is called Hindi. So, it means if you are transferring money over a distance, so, you, you used to get bill of exchange from a reputed money lender and that bill of exchange used to be exchanged at another location, but the at the other location you used to get the money after a discount. So, in that sense that bill of exchange was non par checking facility. Okay. Now, the issue here is that central bank when it came for the first time, it removed that discount thing, which means that for the first time in America, people could write checks, which were issued at par, which were and cashed at par across the nation. Now, you compare to system D centralized 800 currencies, which were non par. And as compared to that one single currency at par. So, naturally Federal Reserve in 1914 was a way better system than 800 currencies during that time. So, that system slowly and

replaced all the previous systems. And that's the way money turned into a central bank and commercial bank kind of a binary system in last 100 years. So this is the short story of money. And if I stretch it this, this thing into a monetary architecture of the global system today. Then, in 1944, we had first global gold standard and Bretton Woods agreement when gold was pegged to $35 off an ounce. That's what a gold one ounce of gold was pegged to $35. And then, after a few years, a couple of decades, Nixon shock happened and America said that it will not honor its relationship with the gold, which means this gold standard was literally killed by America. Now the question is, what happened after that, by then, America was the world's largest trading nation, world's most powerful nation. And it used its oil trade monopoly to basically forced everybody to accept a regime of floating currencies, gold anchor died after 9771 and after that, we have seen a system of floating currencies in which United States dollar is at the top 80% of the global trading happens in US dollar and 99.9999% of all trade happens in dollar. So, as a result, dollar without saying so became official reserve currency of the world. Of course, Euro happened in 2001. But the broader distribution of monetary use across the world did not change much hardly two to 3% change happened. And then China, Russia and Europe, they kept on saying that they want a non dollar payment system with nothing mode very fast. But in recent times, particularly after 2008 financial recession, and now after 2020 financial recession and post pandemic, the voice for creating a non dollar payment system has risen very, very accurately. Another issue here is if we replace dollar payment system with a non dollar payment system, then what it would be this is not just a million dollar question. This is rather a trillion dollar question of today. And nobody knows the answer. And that's where blockchain becomes very, very critical, because if you are shifting from $1 system to an another system, then what form that system would have. So, this is the challenge in which we are about to shift which means that we are at a history Oracle juncture where non linear disruptions would happen, which is called Unknown, Unknown.

So this is the circumstances in which our world is right now. So that's where digital currencies and blockchain become very, very critical. And before I explain blockchain and digital currencies, let me remind you that more than money there is something which is very important more than money. And that is ledger. Because without a ledger money can not be possible. Whatever unit of account somebody might have created behind that there was a ledger, though it was as a centralized ledger. Broadly, if you see over the last 5000 years, there have been only three kinds of ledger technology first was a single entry accounting system which which, which remained there for around 5000 years where debit entries were in the one box, and credit entries in the other box, but both the boxes used to lie at King's palace or tribal chiefs office. Then around 500 years back, we invented another double A system, which is called double entry accounting system where correct entries and debit entries were basically recorded on the same page. On the one side, there were debit entries. On the other side, they were credit entries, and all the total was done at the bottom and the set next page used to start from this. And like this, in this way, it was almost impossible to do any kind of temporary to that PayPal ledger. So in this sense, double entry system created a completely new era of Ledger's and after that, we have never looked back all BUT IT systems even today, they may look at non paper or digital system, but fundamentally they are using double entry Ledger's. Now the issue here is when in 2009, Bitcoin came, it was not just a currency, it was also a very, very new kind of ledger technology, because it was in fact, a triple entry accounting system. If I'm sending Bitcoin to you, then if I am a, then here, B, A is doing a debit entry, I'm sending money to B, then credit entries happening at B's end. But there is a third entry, which is going to blockchain which neither a nor B can reverse, which means that for the first time, we have got a third entry which is visible to everybody in the network. And this was called a shared ledger, a shared database, and tamper proof database which means that now we have got into a system where your ledger cannot be reversed. But in single entry system and double entry system. Ledger's could be changed though it was very difficult to do that. But powerful people could change that those Ledger's. But in blockchain, nobody could change that ledger. So this was a very, very revolutionary thing, because in these systems, centralized parties, kingdoms, or even centralized political parties were very powerful. But here, the system was peer to peer, which means if in this world, nation states were powerful, here, peer to peer actors were powerful. So if you combine this ledger technology with money, then we are at a verge of something, which is actually very, very critical, because now the future would be led by this peer to peer networks, nations had their nations and corporations had their control. But now, the future is going to be led by peer to peer networks. Now, in that thing, Bitcoin basically introduced a kind of press machine, and that press machine slowly and steadily made blockchain a reality for all kinds of systems. Now, if I ask, what is blockchain technology or what is Bitcoin? To be fair, I would say Bitcoin is just a

economic incentive system for auditors, which means that ultimately every monetary system needs a ledger. But the problem here is who will guard the ledger? Who will maintain a ledger. So Bitcoin ensured that auditors of this new system would be a completely new identity call miners. So they will be incentivized to keep a track of all the transactions and they would be rewarded every 10 minutes in a random manner. So this was something which was a completely new concept of ledger. And that made some very, very critical institutional disruption that made intermediaries redundant. In Bitcoin, there is no intermediary. So for the first time in human history, decentralization which used to be only local, now became a global property. Don't forget this particular area, the centralization now shifted from local domain to a global domain. And here, peer to peer actors could build a scalable system scalable to the level of planet. So Bitcoin, basically, unhinged kind of imagination, which was always local earlier. But now, you could think global, you could think big, and that's what blockchain became. And blockchain basically created a system where you had a ledger, which was basically programmed ledger. Now, if ledger can be programmed, and programmed for currencies, so if currencies can be programmed, why not assets can be programmed, why not utilities can be programmed, why not identity can be programmed. So in that sense, we shifted from paper based Ledger's to programmable Ledger's that were shared. So that's where this entire journey started. And in this journey, the future of money started appearing before us and that future of money appeared in multiple avatars and the first avatar that I can I can call is money as cash or money as digital gold for the first time digital money was registered as cash. Now, what do I mean by that, when you do a cash transaction that cash transaction basically mean instant settlement. Because

if you made a payment and the other party is happy with that payment, then there is no reversal your money has shifted to somebody else and that is settlement, okay, no third party is between you and your Counterparty. Now, the issue here is for the first time now, you could do a similar kind of a transaction, but in a digital manner, because Bitcoin has a key pair private key and a public key and all blockchains have this kind of peer to peer system, which means anybody who controls your private key controls your money. So which means that this is exactly like cash, which is immediate settlement, but happening in a digital manner, and no power can actually resist that kind of a transaction. And that's where the system actually appeared almost like digital gold also, because the value of Bitcoin started increasing. So the beauty of Bitcoin is that it is a new kind of ledger technology. Yes. Number two, it is also a new kind of money. Yes. It is also a new kind of cash system. Yes, it is also a new kind of gold. Because the issue here is Bitcoin is not one thing, Bitcoin is multiple things. So that's where people started looking beyond Bitcoin. Because if Bitcoin could do transactions, the problem was Bitcoin had only one serious limit. And that was it could not reach beyond seven transactions per second. And if it was decentralized, then people started thinking that if currencies can be transacted, then can we do something more on blockchain. And that's where another thing happened. People offered new kinds of blockchain with interesting possibility that was called smart contracts. Now, what is a smart contract smart contract is an automated code, which when placed on blockchain becomes irreversible, which means Now, whenever you send a transaction to a smart contract address, that transaction will instantiate certain other transaction, which means it is a automated company. Okay. That's the issue here is that in this kind of reality, we came across something very, very radical. For example, aetherium issued something which was called ERC 20 token standard. And with this token standard, you could do crowdfunding in a completely decentralized manner, somebody from any part of the world could actually fund an application. And in few months, roughly $28 billion of money was raised for around 1500 projects. But this was something which was mind boggling. And here, money as capital was disrupted, no doubt, but more than that money as capital was disrupted. For the first time, you did not have to go to a VC for getting funds by diluting your equity, or for the first time you didn't have to go to a bank for a loan or a private money lender for loan at a astronomical high interest rate. For the first time in human history. aetherium provided money as capital facility, anybody across the world, if likes a project can fund that project. So it is basically building a retail equivalent of venture capital industry. Now, once aetherium did that, then more smart contract platforms came today there are dozens of smart contract platforms in the blockchain industry. tasers is the cardano is there, quantum is there. zilliqa is there. So blockchain has disrupted not just money as cash, it has also disrupted money as capital. And this second disruption is far more powerful than the first disruption because it actually assimilates the first disruption and scales that disruption to a very, very far, far away limits. And the third thing, which is even very, very interesting, and that is money as utility.

Now, just try to feel the experience when you use your Ola cab app. You use an app, you book a driver, you reach a destination, and your bill is deducted from your allamani account. At nowhere you are paying in cash. It means that this is a system where money is basically a utility. And this is called a in app payment. And if you see your phone This is basically a system having multiple applications in bed. Now the issue here is if an app can be hosted on a centralized server, like that of Google or Apple I your store, then why a decentralized application cannot be created with blockchain. And with smart contracts, you could create decentralized applications, and that's where multiple new projects came. For example, decentralized storage file coin is today able to hold 1000 exabytes of data in a decentralized way. It is an independent blockchain dedicated to data storage and you will be surprised it is also So called hard disk of world computer 100 EXA byte and one exabyte is equal to 1000. petabyte, one petabyte is equal to 1000 terabyte and one terabyte is equal to 1000 Giga byte. So, you can see here, the scale at which filecoin has already raised in, reached in a very, very low time. And then for example, there is another project called NMR numera, which is basically a decentralized hedge fund. And already the investments suggested by numeraire are turning out to be most productive investments and, and this project is one of the top blockchain projects in the utility space. And not just this there are multiple other projects like decentralized content delivery network, Tita, basic attention network, which is basically a challenger to Google system, it is basically monetizing your attention because when you use Chrome, or Firefox or Microsoft Edge, they don't pay you because you are basically participating in a system designed by them. But basic attention token project or a bad project has built a new browser, which is called brave. Not brave is a very, very interesting project. It basically blocks all ads and all ad trackers by default. Now, if you opt into choose to watch a particular ad, then brave will give you 70% of the entire ad revenue. And that's the reality, you might not believe it. But the fact is, that brave browser and bat tokens are already having 22 million monthly active users 22 million, and this project has came out has come out of beta phase just last year. And today it has 22 million monthly active users. So what I'm trying to say here is that money as cash was disrupted money as capital was disrupted money as utility was disrupted. Just because we had a new ledger technology called blockchain. And with this blockchain we could create multiple kinds of digital currencies. Bitcoin was a digital currency ether is a digital currency bat, Tita, numerosas, filecoin civic, all these are digital currencies, but they are digital currencies, floating on blockchain. And then, there's also a new model, which is money as privacy, of course, cash would always mean that because cash like corrector, which was introduced by Bitcoin was, would be there repeated in all the other forms, but along with this guy's new features, and this is privacy, whereas a privacy which means nobody can know who sent how much to whom, who sent, how much to whom. So, if privacy is a public requirement at a global level, that there are multiple multiple projects, which are already making that possible dash monero z cache kamado bivouacs. And these projects are in the market for around last four, five years. So, this disruption is continuously happening and now, another disruption is happening which is called money as interoperability, which means that here, one blockchain can talk to another blockchain. If you have Bitcoin and you want to make a transaction on aetherium blockchain, then you can use Cosmos blockchain to make a transaction which is interoperable, so it's like UPI of global blockchains. If UPA can connect 100 banks together with a single unified payment interface. Similarly, Cosmos polka dot and definity like projects can connect all kinds of blockchains together. So this is money as interoperability. And now if you go back to these five slides, money as cash, money as capital, money as utility money as privacy and money as interoperability, these three, these five disruptions are powerful. Sibyl, because digital currencies have been invented with blockchain in a completely new way. And this has happened in last 10 years.

So, this is a great change, which have majority of people are yet to understand, but this is what becomes the core understanding of our students in this particular

program.

So, if you want to see the actual records, in terms of transactions on these chains, Bitcoin has already got gone beyond 590 5 million transactions, proven system aetherium 930 6 million transactions, US 3.9 billion transactions at present, the monthly average is 100 million plus transactions. This is the current reality and in two years, this will go 100x. So

just to clear,

the issue here is that if decentralized currency currencies can be launched on blockchains, then why existing peers should remain silent. And that's where multiple digital currencies are being launched. And first is Facebook. Facebook has re Christian that project as dime dollar, though Libra is still the name. But the issue here is now Facebook is jumping onto blockchain with a new kind of blockchain. And not just Facebook. other social media players like telegram, kik, signal voice, all these players are planning to launch their digital currencies, which means that we are entering the zone of digital currencies, which is going to be a crowded zone. And if corporations are moving into this, then why central banks should be behind. And that's where at present 42 central banks out of 63 are planning to launch CB DC and China has already launched a cbdc called e CP. And it is already testing that cbdc with millions of its users and it is also testing that with Alibaba Ali pay and other WeChat like payment platforms and imfs itself saying that all the countries should move into cbdc model, which means that the demand for non dollar payment system is now coming back through digital currencies. So, now you connect with whatever I have told you up to law. So, here the historical shift is about to happen with digital currencies and blockchain and even Europe is now saying and particularly Bank of England governor is saying that we need to shift into a non dollar payment system. So, if I summarize my last few slides, I would say that these things are happening. First of all, all popera currencies are getting deterritorialized which means you will use currency, but that currency will not be tagged to a particular nation. Second, people will try digital currencies with as well as without blockchains. It's very much possible that central banks will not use blockchain to issue currency because they have constitutional authority to issue currency. So, without central banks, all other players will use blockchain and in this world, both permissionless and permissioned blockchains would come Bitcoin aetherium will is permissionless. But if you start building applications on on Korda on hyper ledger on multi chain, then that will be a permissioned blockchain and the most important thing that would happen that three functions of money, unit of account, medium of exchange and store of value, all these three functions would be done by three different kinds of currencies people may merge them people may separate them. For example, when I make a Bitcoin transaction or aetherium or ether transaction, I use dollar as a unit of account, but medium of exchange is a cryptocurrency. So similarly, people will distinguish between these two Among these three functions, and we'll use money as per their suitability, so, the monopoly of central bank over your money will go away. This is the future that is actually knocking at our door. Now, it may not happen in every country very soon, but in some countries it it will happen very fast. For example, in India already there are 6 million users using cryptocurrencies and even Africa is moving very fast on the part of cryptocurrencies, broadly in the world there are at present 100 million digital currency users, if you mean by blockchain based digital currencies, and these transactions remain resemble, like barter, but in an electronic manner, peer to peer actors across the world can make a transaction and settle it on blockchain. So, this is I wanted to share with you now, I'm open to your questions. There are two hands. Pradeep and Mia, let me start with Mira, who said

Go ahead, ask your question. Please unmute yourself and ask. Okay, I think there might be some issue. Pradeep Can you start

to debut unmute yourself and ask your voice is very low. Can you come closer to mic? It's very low. It's very, very low.

Can you get me?

Yes, BIT bit better? Go ahead. Yeah, buddy, you're not audible. Can you do something with your mic? In the meanwhile, I will go to third person Kumar. Please go ahead.

Hi, Sunil Mar double. Yeah, perfect. Thanks a little further detailed in the presentation. so fascinating. There are a couple of questions I have going on. One is, as the first thing has you mentioned, I'm not into the financial sector. I'm really into a product manager, probably business analysts know that because I don't have the finger knowledge at all. So that's the first point. So how would I? What are the requests for me? First question would be, as you mentioned, I'm a kind of techno functional but not core programmer. Right. So I think that you already answered first

is I'm actually looking for a blockchain course with a kind of Master's in it, not at least a specialization kind of anything in that. So could you please provide me insights of these things?

Okay. Okay. See Kumar, the issue here is that 70% of the students who join this program, they are techno functional 70%. So your case is not different from them. And this is a very, very common question that is being asked continuously till date. And for this kind of a situation, we have basically designed the system in such a manner that people who want to focus on developer track, they will get that kind of customized treatment and people who want to focus on management track, they will get that kind of customers treatment, for example. Just last week, the cohort five which is currently going on had its lab. And that lab was aetherium. Lab module to lab. And we divided entire participants into two groups. One was management track, other was developer track, and in management track, there were three groups, each group was having six to eight people. And then there were developer group four groups and each group was having six to eight people. So in this way, I was leading as a lead faculty, the management track assignment and the other faculty members were leading the aetherium developer track assignment. One management track given was assignment called blockchain based business models, we gave them three use cases and out of which they have to build a complete business model in a single day. And the other group was given three assignments out of which they have to pick one and build a PLC PLC means they have to design an architecture as well as show a running code by end of the day. So in that sense, people who wanted to opt for management track they did and they the people who opted for developer track, they did. So in that sense, the program is sufficiently flexible for all kinds of people, because these labs are graded. And that's where we want to help you, you should not fall into your weaker zone. that's point number one. The second thing here is that when blockchain is discussed, of course, there would be some technical issue. If you ask that you will be able to find a person in this world who knows everything, every story around blockchain. No, nobody even I would say that. I, I know a lot of things. But I'm yet to know a lot, many others. Every day when I sleep, half of my tabs remain open, I'm not able to finish them because this area is too wide. So that says I would suggest you that anybody who has love for technology can acclimatize with this particular course. Is that fine Kumar.

Yes. Thank you.

Okay. Should

I have Sorry, sorry for the interruption.

Yeah. Kumar. Yes. Yes. And

I my question, third question was, so, do you have any program kind of masters in master specialization blockchain

see the issue here is Kumar at present there is no master's program in an entire country. Okay, because no B school has started a master's program on blockchain till date. In terms of comprehensive coverage, this program is the fast containing the vast subject matter equalent to executive master's program, because here not only we are teaching Bitcoin, Ethereum and hyperledger, with hands on experience, we are also teaching cbdcs. We are also teaching other enterprise blockchains how to write a white paper, what is the future of money, all those things all packed into one. The fact here is not only that we do wetness day mentoring sessions, both one to one as well as open to all which means that the kind of intensive interaction which you get here, you can get only in a master's program. So in that sense, this is a unique program, you really want to get something like this anywhere else. Okay. Yeah. Go ahead. You can unmute yourself. Yeah, me? Yeah. Yeah.

Thank you. So my son, Shiva, I'm having a couple of years of experience in SAP. I'm also a functional consultant. Working with one of the big prop nation. I don't have much knowledge on this blockchain. Ethereum. I just want to understand as a function guy, how can I see myself in blockchain profile?

Okay, see, ya got it? Sure. I have answered a part of caution in my response to earlier question, but now I'm going to add to it now, as far as carrier roles in blockchain space are concerned, I would say broadly at a at a massive level at a macro level, there are three major roles. First role is blockchain developer. Now, blockchain developer role is a role where you just need to know one or two technology platforms for example, you can become if you know solidity enough, then you can become aetherium developer or if you know golang enough, then you can become a hyper ledger, blockchain developer. So these are the jobs which fit you around 10 to 15 lakh per annum. So this is the category. The second category is is blockchain architect. Now, architect is somebody who has a 360 degree view of it. Technology implementation and that's where huge responsibilities lie and a blockchain architect would start somewhere around 25 lakh per annum and go up to 50 lakh per annum in India. And if you move out of India, a blockchain architect would start around $150,000. So, this is a broad role in the third role, which is actually far more important than these two roles is called blockchain consortium manager. A blockchain consortium manager is the person who actually becomes the go to person for a large blockchain consortium who is a bridge between designing a new blockchain project for multiple partners, multiple stakeholders, whether it is insurance payments, trade finance or whatever. Not this is a person who must be a techno functional number one, but must have a good understanding of blockchain based business model and that's an area where we specialize because the management track kind of assignments that we do here is something nobody is doing in the entire market. So, this is an area where we actually train people and a blockchain consortium manager can easily get anything between 5050 lakhs to 80 lakhs per annum. So, these are the kinds of packages which are in the market for different kinds of blockchain skills. Okay. Roger, yeah, okay.

Thank you. But as I said, Solitaire and gold is a development tool, like any particular language kind on Java dotnet. php,

the issue is that there are multiple technology platforms if you want to use aetherium then you need to know solidarity. If you want to do it on hyper ledger, then you need to do Golan if you want to do Korda then you need to know kotlin if you want to do it on multi gender, you need to know c++. So like this multiple technology platforms are built in multiple programming languages.

Hi, Sunil. Good evening. Can

you hear me? Yeah, yeah, go ahead.

Okay. So you have already talked about, like Ethereum platform and how this course was going to enlighten everyone. The development and the setting up the blockchain network, will this course be going to show us how to create a network and like cloud based environment because talking about that blockchain architect, who would be looking into which platform like AWS or Google, Google Kubernetes, where the actual network going to be set up the blockchain network? And the second question is, what about permission blockchain? We spoke about aetherium and Bitcoin, what about Korda and these permission blocks in there?

Got it. Got it. Got it. Roger. The issue is that I also mentioned hyper ledger. We basically do three mini projects, as far as a dozen more practical assignments, as well as a project hackathon. So three mini projects first mini project is about aetherium. Second mini project is hype about hyper ledger fabric. Third one is hyperledger besu. And then final project is hackathon which you can choose of out of any these platforms, you can you can build it on fabric, you can build it on Ethereum. So, in that sense, this, this course takes care of both permissioned or private blockchains as well as public or permissionless blockchains. So there is no bias, rather, hyper ledger takes more time than aetherium that's one thing. Second thing is that once you master hyper ledger implementation, which where you will spend around 34 hours spending on hyper ledger, once you mastered that, then building equalent of that using as you or other blockchain as service patrons is not a very difficult thing and we will give you sufficient training on that. Thank you. Okay, Suresh. Yeah.

Good evening. Can you hear me?

Yeah, go ahead. Okay.

So, my question is more into the foreign exchange fluctuations, as we see today, it will be Sell as a no cost different across the different geographies and countries. So, but what is the impact of the blockchain once it has been accepted by different commodities and different stakeholders? So, how it really you know, like the benefits you know, this kind of a global conference right because the trading and the

commodities

just hold the issue here is are you talking of public blockchains or permissioned blockchains

public blockchain

okay. So, the issue here is when you talk of public blockchains no foreign currency is actually on a public blockchains we just denominate these currencies these these digital currencies in dollar or pound or rupee The fact is they are independent tokens which are native to those blockchains they are not foreign exchange exchange currencies, try to understand that and volatility is basically a subject matter of supply and demand, why bitcoin price is increasing today, because demand is increasing and bitcoins supply is now very, very less nearly 90% of bitcoins have already been re released into the market. Same is true of aetherium. Now, something which is now low in supply and high in demand, it will obviously see a price increase and that's where volatility will come. So, okay. So, I hope you are understanding the actual reality. Yeah, I got it. But

what about the private blockchain in case of red block?

Yes. Now, the issue here is that in a private blockchain private blockchains are those blockchains where you can do without creating a token you don't need to create independent cryptocurrency that's the major difference between a private and a public blockchain Okay, we're all the transactions are basically messages and in those messages, you can program currencies, you can program assets, you can program identities, whatever you want to program.

Yes, yes. Yeah,

it's rule based or no policy based excetera.

Exactly. Okay. Yeah. Pradeep Are you back? Yeah. But no, your your voice is still not audible. Let me go to the

buddy, can you write it in the chat box? Just a minute, just a minute. Let me check. Just give me a moment.

It is a customer of blockchain.

Suresh, can you mute yourself? Your question is about can you elaborate about trade marketing and about faster trade, faster trade in what

coverage because I can

see, try to understand that. This is a new ledger technology. And in this ledger technology. The biggest uniqueness is that transparent settlement system. And this transparent settlement system. Let me give you an example. For example, these days when you make a purchase on a stock exchange, though you can make a purchase in few seconds. But the thing here is that the system takes two to three days to do reconciliation and settlement. So this is broadly called t plus three settlement system in a blockchain Pradeep the system is not t plus three it is t plus zero, which means this is a not just real time transaction system. It is also a real time settlement system which means that the capital or the liquidity which was locked for two to three days would not be done here. So if you're thinking at a scale of trillions of rupees worth transaction in a day, then you will unlock a lot of liquidity into the system. So this is not Just a system for speed this is a system for a transparent reconciliation and settlement. Okay.

Pooja has asked ama management graduate Do we need a background in computer science to be in this course, Pooja, I don't have a computer science background, if I can become the teacher of this zone anybody can become. So, I hope that answers you but if you want to ask please go ahead and ask raise your hand so that I can allow you anybody else Shiva has asked after completion of this course is there any placement assistance provided? See At present we are not doing active placement assistance to anybody, but yes some of the people who are trained here they got placement because Tech Mahindra had some people who were part of our cohort. So, because of those cross connections, people do get placement and sometimes industry participants, industry speakers who come to our program, for example, recent in last two years, multiple companies, blockchain companies have come to our program and they look for for recruiting those people, but in majority of cases most of our students are working professionals. So they are not looking for placement assistance.

Sorry to interrupt as I said. So Tech Mahindra And apart from that is any other companies implementing the blockchain? Why? Because I see one of my friends has done blockchain from a different industry I cannot name it. But it's almost more than a year. He told me he's not getting called for the blockchain okay. To be honest, but again, I want to learn the block

got caught

and what is the major different from other industries to add to Blighty when it comes to blockchain programming,

can you give me an example so that I can compare

I cannot ever because as it having said that my friend already learned okay. He's also working with us internet. Still we both have the same organization he tried but still even get on a blockchain we are in do now same function.

Just hold just hold on. See the fact here is that COVID has actually changed some sectors in a very, very fundamental manner. And particularly three or four major sectors are hugely impacted. First sector is drug supply chain, drug supply chain is an area where all regulators are realizing that a blockchain based drug supply chain is key to public health. That's one thing. Second thing is food industry. And you know that Corona happened just because of nontransparent food supply change. And most of countries have realized that traceability and trackability in food sector is going to be very, very important. Third thing is trade finance. At present most of SME companies are, are facing problems of liquidity. And generally, trade finance is done by private sector banks and they don't want to fund new players, because there is a lot of risk. Now, in that kind of a scenario. If there is a trade finance on blockchain, then the possibility of sharing the risk across all the stakeholders would be there and you can actually finance even smaller and newer players. Now, if you look at the scale of trade finance industry, this is around $15 trillion $15 trillion 90% of global trade needs trade finance. Now, the issue here is that since Coronavirus, has created a situation where things that would have taken years to happen, will happen in few weeks. So that trend towards digital transformation is now so huge that It blockchain particularly in bruk supply chain in food sector in trade finance will move very very fast for your information in Telangana. chit fund industry is entirely on blockchain. And this has happened in less than two years, less than two years. First PLC for Chitwan industry of Telangana was launched in October 2018, by my friends in less than two years and targett fund industry is on blockchain. So the issue here is there are two choices either wait for few more years for mainstream adoption of blockchain or try to enter into unique areas where the opportunity is only going to scale at a compound growth rate. So these are two choices, it depends upon who will take that choice. And we not only teach hyper ledger, or aetherium, or other enterprise blockchain, we also teach you how to identify that area of blockchain adoption, which has a minimum friction, and how to enter that particular zone with what kind of rules. So this is something which is a choice, for example. Even Amazon started with selling books online, and today it is selling 1.5 million goods on online. So the issue here is whether you want to start now and catch up a wave which is increasing in its density, or you want to wait for another few years, when everything is commoditize when everything is normalized. So this is a choice, and this is a personal choice. Okay. Go ahead. Thank you. Oh,

I

know, I have almost 10 plus years of experience in banking. And I've done a break for last two years. And I am looking forward for this court. I will How will this be useful to me when I joined back? Or how will it be useful? How will I be able to use my domain knowledge or experience and where do I see myself I'm in

after doing this. Okay. See, first of all, let me share some interesting bfsi experiments in blockchain space, which are happening right now. npca National payment Corporation of India is thinking of not just thinking is actively implementing a major blockchain project, major blockchain project and that project is called I think project Garuda. That's one thing. And second thing is that RBA is now thinking seriously in terms of cbdc. Of course, they did not think of this project earlier. But recently, RBA is turning very, very serious in launching the CB, DC because China has moved on that front very, very fast. Facebook has moved on that front very, very fast. So for a central bank, the choice is whether to keep this field open for others to enter or to self populate this particular space. So things have changed dramatically in favor of central bank digital currencies and some kind of blockchain would be used for that, whether that would be Korda or hyper ledger, nobody knows. But this is a space where things are moving very, very fast. And the moment Corona virus vaccine becomes mainstream, which is going to happen in next few months. You will see banking and financial players using blockchain in a big way. And patchwork. The people who have comprehensive blockchain training would get major opportunities in bfsi sector.

Okay, because there was some term that you used in the presentations. The other major of them, I thought I was hearing them for the first time and was wondering how well would I cope up with the the entire course in six months time? How do you think will that be?

The issue here is that we have multiple ways of handling that. First of all, we have classes only once a week only on Saturdays number one, okay. Okay. three sessions on Saturday alone, which means you have rest of the week. to grasp all the learnings that have happened on Saturdays, that's number one. Now, apart from that, we have two extra days two optional days where you can get back to us one is on Sunday morning, then second one is on witnessed his evening on these two days, which are optional days, if you have a doubt, then you get get doubt clarification, one on Sunday and another one on witnessing. Apart from that, we have a third offering that is called One to One mentoring session. For example, you want to get an inside knowledge of an area where you want to specialize, it may be let's assume trade finance or you want to build a new project are you want to start initiate a new startup. So, this is one to one mentoring. Now, it is all up to you at which level you want to engage with us. And as far as learning blockchain is concerned, I can assure you, once you join the program, learning blockchain would not be a challenge. Rather, the biggest challenge would be for you how to absorb this new knowledge because this would actually challenge you at multiple levels. Number one, you might be attracted towards ply chain, you might be attracted to what remittances sector you might be attracted towards a completely vehicle lifecycle management industry, because these are industries where blockchain adoption is going to happen in a massive way. So, I would say that you might get puzzled about one thing whether to stick to banking sector or you need to go beyond that, because recently, a friend of mine who is a blockchain developer, shifted her job and she left her previous job at 10 lakh package and joined new job at 80 lakh package and the most interesting part of that story was that the new company which was offering that package was just a start. So, established company is giving 10 lakh and a new startup is giving 80 lakh Why? The precise reason was that she was a trained solidity developer.

As you said, this solid indie developer as well as go Lang was also mentioned in answering some of the queries. So these we need to be prepared beforehand before start Oh,

no, not not not not not not you don't need to have any prior knowledge of that, we expose you towards all those things in a slow and graded learning manner. Okay, apart from regular instruction sessions, which happen on Saturdays and other options sessions on Sundays and Wednesdays we also make you undergoes some assignments which can be check for understanding kind of simple multiple choice questions or which may be practical code based assignments. For example, we will give you a small assignment Write a four lines of code. And, of course, every assignment would be given a context, every assignment would have explainer video afterwards. And apart from that, there are other support materials, you will also get a separate paper space account where you can actually test your own applications. Okay. Friends, I think we have already crossed 20 minutes past seven. Let me finally take two more questions and bind up. shobhit has asked how many startups have come up from previous cohorts. So bit, we have four startups. The first startup that came out of Cohort One was called ously medicine which is basically anti counterfeit drug supply chain solution. Second one is called pharma farm block, which is basically an end to end transparency solution for high value diagnostic products. Then there is a third one called zero blocks, which is a real estate based blockchain solution. And the fourth one is a blockchain policy group which is proposing using blockchain for creating coins parade currencies. So, these are the four starters which have already come out of our previous cohorts. One more question. Anybody would like to ask please raise your hand. Last question.

Yes. So as I hear lending the blockchain so most of the people looking for the startup, what is your major difference for the startup and getting a new job on blockchain?

comm again, last part coming in?

What is the major difference between getting a new job in blockchain startup

that's your choice. If you

haven't compared to other technologies involved

in blockchain, initiating a startup is way easier than initiating a startup in any other field. Because here the scope of that validation is way higher than in other sector because this is a deep tech is an emerging field and scope of growth is huge in this area. So that is definitely a possibility. But initiating a startup is not everybody's cup of tea, because a startup would require multiple kinds of capabilities to come together and you must have at least two to three persons to start a new venture. So that's something which only few people can take. So that's something which I want to just everybody should take and last question to srivalli

shivali Please unmute yourself. There might be some issue with shriveling. Surely as as someone told Java and Linux is required for technical without technical also we can we work in blockchain? Surely, that's not true. You don't need to have prior understanding of Java or Linux to work in this area. Because if you want to become a blockchain consortium manager, then your role will be broadly techno functional. So, blockchain has both kinds of opportunity management track opportunity and developer track opportunities. Both these areas are open

Nagesh euro, plastic currency, paper currency now digital how it looks like Sir, can we see it? See, the thing here is we don't see, just by our eyes, we actually experienced a change through multiple manners. And because we we are, we are creators who grasp knowledge through five different senses. And in that sense, I would say that, yes, digital currencies are deeply transformational, and blockchain is a big force behind that. OK, friends, let's have wind of the session today. I hope the session was interesting for all of you and I have answered most of your questions. So let's catch up again next

Tuesday. Say sorry to interrupt. There's a poll added there. So we need if we can quickly launch it, we'll be able to get guide or sure done thanks.

Watch the entire interview here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlCcflYjDhw