“Blockchain for Hire…”
Stratis is a UK company who have designed a blockchain as a service application (essentially a platform) on top of which companies are able to deploy their own decentralized applications.
Launched in early 2016, the company appears to have gone from strength to strength.
Contrary to many other crypto systems, its underlying premise lies in its business focus.
In other words, rather than having built a blockchain system on top of another protocol etc – the blockchain things came as a result of their work within the business environment.
Therefore, you have to appreciate that whilst looking at their growth on the various coin price tracking websites, the reality of Stratis lies in its revenue & profit in the *real* world.
Their business is based in the UK and therefore they are mainly operating in that market, with customers in the likes of Saudi Arabia and several other countries. Although this not only means they’re able to provide global work, it means that every time they provide a solution to a buyer, they’re getting paid to implement it.
As ever, please appreciate this is not a recommendation or endorsement for any particular security or asset. If you are looking for investment advice, please consult a professional (regulated) financial adviser.
What is Stratis?
In terms of a crypto system, Stratis is most similar to Ethereum.
They’re basically both platforms and both have a core set of business functions at their core. The main difference, however, is that Stratis was not designed to be a disruptive system (in the same way that Ethereum was) – it was designed to facilitate the business service the UK company provided.
Most specifically, the Stratis model is focused on giving companies (many of whom keep C# developers on the payroll) the ability to create decentralized, scalable applications on top of their platform/framework.
This is probably the best feature of the system – the ability to integrate directly with the existing C# / .NET development stack. Rather than having to rewrite large parts of existing systems, it means the user is able to design the parts they need without having the expenses of new development staff etc.
More specific features of the framework include:
- Sidechains
Rather than keeping all transactions in one central blockchain system, Stratis splits them into “sidechains” – this not only increases security but ensures the system is able to manage its various data properly.
- Masternodes
Implemented by Stellar recently, the idea of Masternodes gives the processing network behind a blockchain solution the ability to run without having preferred network mining nodes.
- Proof-of-Stake
Famously integrated into Ethereum recently, this concept shipped with the initial version of Stratis. Not only does this mean that processing / transaction times should be much quicker, but it also means that the system will be secure from the get-go.
- C#
The preferred language of Microsoft-stack developers the world over, C#’s popularity has waned in recent years, due mainly to the rise of HTML/web. It’s the core language behind Stratis, allowing users to create robust & secure applications with it.
Who created it?
Because Stratis is primarily a commercial venture, the team behind it are all fully-paid staff…
The core management team consists of:
- Chris Trew (CEO/Founder)
Consultant with 10 years+ experience in the financial legal, aviation and Local government sectors. Involved with blockchain technology since 2013, it appears he is the main technical lead behind the team developing the platform.
- Policarpo Guerrero (Director of Operations)
Seems to have a focus on the organization of the company, and getting development created successfully on time. Apparently heavily involved in the cryptocurrency space since 2013, building on a wealth of experience with companies from Nokia in Latin America to Kodak in the USSR.
Why does it exist?
The point of the Stratis business seems to be to provide business / enterprise customers with the ability to integrate blockchain into their wider business systems. As such, the underlying principles behind their platform can be best evidenced here:
Blockchain or Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) offers a radically different paradigm of storing and managing information online. Decentralised ledgers lack the points of failure and associated security issues of traditional databases and top-down protocols, whilst at the same time posing their own unique challenges for effective deployment and maintenance.
The advantages in terms of costs, transparency, immutability, security and confidence that are characteristic of blockchain solutions mean that financial businesses, government departments and other organisations are exploring applications of all kinds with a view to delivering services more profitably and efficiently.
However, reliable deployment of a new blockchain fit for purpose entails extensive overheads in terms of network infrastructure, development, security and ongoing maintenance. Moreover, use of an existing blockchain (such as Bitcoin) comes with numerous problems for a mainstream business, not least because users have no control over blockchain features or future development.
Stratis will take a similar approach to blockchain deployment, enabling organisations to provision their own private blockchains, tailored to their precise needs but secured on the parent Stratis chain. This approach means there are few unnecessary overheads whilst allowing businesses to secure the benefits of a blockchain-based solution, developing services via powerful APIs and lite web-based clients.
You can view the Whitepaper here.
Trajectory
Contrary to other platforms in the space, Stratis has slipped backwards in terms of both market cap and price. The reason for this is simple – lack of adoption.
Unlike such platforms as Ripple, Ethereum and Stellar – whilst the underlying premise & platform still exists, the issue for most people is they are simply unable to quantify what the system is actually about.
Part “blockchain as a service”, part infrastructure layer – the Stratis system is extremely under-supported in the sense that it doesn’t really provide much of a system that can be bought into, either figuratively or literally.
Ultimately, the only thing that matters with the Stratis system is how well the underlying company is able to provide users with the ability to benefit from the new wave of decentralized technology. And in the case of this product, being able to do this is somewhat challenging due to their focus on commercial integration.
In terms of market adoption, the general consensus is that while Stratis works well to provide its service to business, whether the system is an investable asset is another question entirely.
