More aerospace and defence companies to integrate blockchain by 2021

Air June 21, 2018

A newly published report from Accenture has shown that six in seven aerospace and defence companies plan to integrate blockchain into their business within the next three years.

For those unaware, blockchain is an emergent digital ledger that maintains and records data in a way that enables stakeholders to confidently and securely share their information.

In its report – entitled ‘Launchpad to Relevance: Aerospace & Defence Technology Vision 2018’ – Accenture revealed that blockchain could help the aerospace industry to reduce maintenance costs, improve aircraft availability, and eliminate errors in the tracking of aircraft parts, and so far the industry seems receptive.

According to Accenture, 86% of respondents said they planned to integrate blockchain into their corporate systems by 2021 – a higher percentage than all but two of the 18 industries surveyed as part of the company’s broader Technology Vision 2018 research.

“Blockchain is well-suited to improve the performance of one of the world’s most complex, globally interconnected and security-dependent supply chains,” said John Schmidt, who leads Accenture’s aerospace and defence practice globally. “This elegant and paradigm-shifting technology has the potential to deliver profound benefits for the hundreds of suppliers typically involved in the manufacturing of a single aircraft.”

Accenture’s research found that more than two-thirds (70%) of aerospace and defence sector executives thought their company would have to contend with corrupted insights as falsified data infiltrated their data-driven information systems.

What’s more, nearly three-quarters (73%) believed that businesses were basing their most critical systems and strategies on data – yet many have not invested in the capabilities to verify the accuracy of that data. And the same number (73%) also believed that automated systems created new risks, including fake data, data manipulation and inherent bias.

Here, blockchain has a role to play in ferreting out falsified data because it provides a secure and unchangeable data chain. “Knowing the actual configuration of an in-service aircraft at any point time is important,” concluded Schmidt. “Blockchain enables aerospace and defence companies to securely share, capture and authenticate data from a single source.”

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