Walmart Canada will use blockchain technology to track shipments, transactions and payments.
This new DLT, not an actual blockchain, is the result of the collaboration between Walmart Canada which counts more than 400 stores in the territory and more than 85 thousand employees, and the company DLT Labs, which thanks to its platform provides solutions for this type of case.
The DLT will be used to integrate and track data from the entire process and allow the parties to monitor and update information on goods, all without having to use a complex and expensive system for the end-user.
It will be a powerful platform that will help maintain leadership in this area, as Walmart Canada’s senior vice president, John Bayliss, commented:
“Walmart Canada is dedicated to efficiency across our business, including most importantly in our supply chain and logistics management. Our carrier partners move over 500,000 loads of inventory nationally, which create an extraordinary volume of transaction data. This new dynamic and interactive blockchain technology platform is creating complete transparency between Walmart Canada and all of our carrier partners. Blockchain is enabling a material advance in our smart transportation network, with expedited payments, extensive cost savings and other benefits among our supply chain. Moreover, this degree of improved efficiency represents a powerful platform for us to continue to reduce our environmental footprint and continue our leadership in environmental sustainability”.
DLT Labs CEO, Loudon Owen, was also very pleased to work with one of the largest entities in the industry:
“Walmart is a global leader in innovation, with a relentless focus on improving people’s lives, and DLT Labs™ is delighted to partner with such an extraordinary organization to bring the world’s first and largest blockchain solution for industry into production. This proves the high value of blockchain and sets the stage to revolutionize supply chain management and logistics, due to its ability to enable secure information sharing, manage trust and reduce waste in multi-partner operational processes”.
Considering the enormous scale of Walmart, a player with 1.2 million daily users, and the coverage it has in Canada, such adoption will certainly impact the entire process of distributing goods, with a significant reduction in costs.
However, it should be kept in mind that we are talking about DLT systems and not about blockchain specifically. DLT systems have a number of features and functions that make their use less safe and unsuitable for a solid structure to rely on, as the data can be modified from within and access can be banned, which means that they are in fact closed and highly centralised.
Several companies in the industry are already using blockchain technology, such as Carrefour, but often it is a move made only for marketing purposes and not for a real need or requirement. In most cases this is about DLT and not blockchain, which leads to confusion and misinformation about what are actually the technologies used by the company itself, because as is known this results in an increased cost of the final product, at the expense of the customer, which is justified only if it actually makes use of a public blockchain.
