Chain Business Insights, an independent research firm focused on the application of blockchain in supply chain management and trade finance, has published its latest research brief. Smart Contracts in Supply Chain: Making Sense of a Potential Game Changer explains the concept of smart contracts and their application in supply chains, as well as highlighting their pros and cons. It also lays out an initial path for gaining expertise in these tools.

Consider this scenario described in a recent Forbes blog post: “Every quarter, a PR department receives the final quarterly financial numbers via email ahead of the earnings announcement in order to prepare a press release. The PR draft will be shared via email by a select group within the company before being approved and ready to be distributed out on the news wires. When pulling that financial information from the ERP system - a system that usually lives behind the corporate firewall with strong security and identity controls in place and with business owners who govern access to the systems and data within - we’ve instantly taken that formerly safe data and shared it freely by email as an Excel file.”