Blockchain + supply chain: jointly build a unified national market

Consumers trace the source of imported apples using JD Zhizhen Chain’s anti-counterfeiting traceability platform

Recently, the epidemic has spread in many places across the country, and the importance of smooth logistics and the stability of the industrial and supply chains has become prominent. The "Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Accelerating the Construction of a National Unified Large Market" issued on April 10 pointed out that based on domestic demand, smooth circulation is the primary task, and it is required to create and lead demand with high-quality supply, so that production, distribution, circulation, and consumption All links are smoother and the efficiency of market operation is improved.

A stable and smooth supply chain is the vitality of the national unified market. A number of industry experts pointed out in an interview with "China Electronics News" that information technologies such as blockchain will play a greater role in the standards and constraints of the underlying operation of the national unified large market. From product traceability, supply chain management to data sharing, blockchain will significantly enhance the accuracy and agility of supply chain collaborative operations, and is expected to accelerate the digitization and modernization of my country's supply chain.

Under the epidemic situation, "positive samples" of imported cold chain commodities occurred frequently, which triggered a crisis of people's trust in food safety. Raw material procurement, warehousing and transportation, order processing, wholesale operation, terminal retail, any link "stuck" will affect food circulation and "dining table" safety.

Product traceability is an end-to-end system. Take the food traceability system as an example, in which data is provided by different participating nodes such as purchasers, logistics providers, and sellers. They do not belong to the same organization, and there is "distrust" between them. Using blockchain technology to realize the traceability and visualization of the commodity flow chain, to ensure that the whole process status information of each participating node is authentic and traceable, and multiple entities such as regulatory agencies, buyers, and upstream and downstream enterprises in the industrial chain can track products.

Food traceability is one of the most mature cases in product traceability. Enterprises in vertical industries have also achieved remarkable results in traceability of supply chains such as pharmaceuticals and key components by using blockchain.

Gannan navel orange, Xinjiang jujube, Wuchang rice, Qinghai wild black wolfberry, Anhua black tea... These familiar local specialties have entered the Chinese food chain platform created by Beijing Taiyi Cloud Technology Co., Ltd. The platform takes food safety traceability as the starting point, gathers origin producers, processors, logistics providers, e-commerce and sellers, and end consumers in China's food chain ecosystem, and establishes a Chinese food chain that is co-governed both on-chain and off-chain. The credit system of the industry, as well as the traceable food production and distribution system.

Relying on JD Cloud's technology base and "industrial genes", the JD Zhizhen Chain anti-counterfeit traceability platform has provided services for dozens of online and offline retail scenarios, including fresh food, maternal and child products, cosmetics, luxury goods, cross-border commodities, and medicine, and more than 1,500 retailers. Enterprises, providing "end-to-end" traceability services, covering more than 1,900 brands and 400,000 kinds of products, with off-chain data reaching 1 billion levels.

JD Technology’s Zhizhen Chain anti-counterfeiting traceability platform has provided “end-to-end” services for dozens of online and offline retail scenarios and more than 1,500 companies, including fresh food, maternal and child products, cosmetics, luxury goods, cross-border commodities, and pharmaceuticals. The traceability system covers 400,000 kinds of products of more than 1,900 brands, and the off-chain data reaches 1 billion levels.

For another example, in terms of anti-counterfeiting and traceability of key industrial parts, Sany Group previously used white coated paper to carry material labels as product identification. Due to the large number of product accessories and the wide range of product accessories, they often encountered counterfeit attacks during the sales of accessories. In addition, the circulation process of accessories is invisible, and the data is difficult to be traced. After Sany Group and Shugen Gezhi Technology (Hunan) Co., Ltd. jointly built the "Industrial Parts Anti-counterfeit Traceability System", the circulation data of parts can be uploaded in real time, and the whole link of the "factory-customer" circulation process of parts is 100% visible. The rate of counterfeit and shoddy parts of customers has been reduced to less than 1%, and the sales of accessories have increased by 5%, realizing the anti-counterfeiting of accessories in the true sense.

Liu Lichao, director of blockchain products of China Unicom, told the reporter of China Electronics News that at present, the product traceability systems built by different industries using blockchain are mainly for high-value and high-harm product categories. The essence of full-process digital traceability is to enable products to burst out with more vitality and value potential, and to bring differentiated value-added to the business.

After several years of exploration, the construction of my country's traceability system has long been no longer limited to the construction of a single enterprise, but a system that only uses and unblocks the "internal circulation". Liu Quan, president of CCID Blockchain Research Institute, said in an interview with a reporter from "China Electronics News" that at present, the traceability and controllability of the entire life cycle of commodities in different industries has achieved results, and the construction of the traceability system is moving towards a National industry traceability system development.

"In the development trend of a unified national market, the supply chains of various industries are complex and changeable. To fully cover the life cycle, we must rely on a nationwide traceability system to ensure that the information of the entire supply chain can be stored and communicated perfectly. Interconnection and supervision." Yang Dong, dean of the Interdisciplinary Research Institute of Renmin University of China and executive director of the Blockchain Research Institute, said in an interview with a reporter from China Electronics News. In his view, blockchain ecosystem infrastructures such as Spark Chain Network, Changan Chain and BSN (Blockchain Service Network Development Alliance) are actively building a nationwide blockchain service ecological network towards this vision, providing cross-border Enterprise and cross-industry common use.

The underlying operating standards and constraints of the national unified market are essentially a set of consensus mechanisms in blockchain supply chain management. Experts believe that the geographic location of the main body of the supply chain is scattered and the management system is difficult to interact, which can easily lead to a disconnect in the supply chain coordination process. As a distributed accounting technology, blockchain naturally fits the scattered and complex characteristics of supply chain collaborative entities. It can connect supply chain entities together and provide an efficient basic platform or tool for collaboration.

In June last year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Central Network Information Office jointly issued the "Guiding Opinions on Accelerating the Application of Blockchain Technology and Industrial Development", which clarified the transformation path of blockchain to supply chain management, that is, to promote enterprise construction based on district The blockchain supply chain management platform integrates logistics, information flow, and capital flow to improve supply chain efficiency and reduce business risks and costs.

Compared with the shaping of the value of the commodity itself by the traceability system, the essence of the blockchain's coordination of the supply chain is to enhance the accuracy and agility of the collaborative operation of the industrial chain and supply chain. After the two ministries issued documents, various enterprises responded positively, and a group of enterprises have taken the lead in exploring the establishment of a blockchain-based ubiquitous supply chain collaboration platform.

Around the "5G network co-construction and sharing cooperation agreement" signed by the two parties, China Unicom and China Telecom have built a blockchain scheduling platform. In co-construction and sharing, how can the two parties share the construction, operation and maintenance according to the agreed division of labor and cooperation, so as to prevent the phenomenon of "wrangling" in the co-construction?

Liu Lichao told reporters that the blockchain scheduling platform follows the collaborative networking architecture of "one physical network, two logical networks, and multiple customized private networks". During the construction process of both parties for 5G network planning, construction, operation and maintenance, all key shared parameters are uploaded to the chain for verification, the management consensus principle is written into the smart contract, and the bilateral data information of the work order is confirmed, which efficiently supports Process collaboration under the co-construction and sharing model comprehensively improves the capabilities and efficiency of network co-construction, co-maintenance, and co-management.

Focusing on their own vertical industries, many leading companies have abandoned the traditional large and comprehensive vertical supply chain management methods, and turned to professional and collaborative horizontal joint resource allocation methods to form a strategy of "strong alliances and complementary advantages" The alliance effectively integrates logistics, information flow, and capital flow, improves the efficiency of the supply chain, forms a complete value chain to participate in market competition, and realizes the complementarity and integration of superior resources. For example, Ansteel Group's smart supply chain comprehensive service ecological platform centered on the iron and steel industry, State Grid Qinghai Provincial Electric Power Company's research on shared energy storage business based on blockchain, CRRC's blockchain-based supply chain whole-process data collaboration Management platform, China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation's ship supply chain management and collaborative design and manufacturing platform based on blockchain technology.

"The use of blockchain technology to achieve real-time sharing of supply chain processes can help companies grasp the supply and demand information of other participants in the supply chain, adjust production, procurement, and inventory management and decision-making in a timely manner, optimize supply chain management, and reduce costs." Yang Dong said .

The relevant person in charge of Lenovo Group told the "China Electronics News" reporter that from a physical point of view, the real commercial network based on the supply chain and the blockchain network can completely overlap; and from the perspective of value transfer, the smart contract of the blockchain node It can also realize the whole process delivery of supply chain value.

"In practice, we are still in the process of building a single enterprise to build an alliance, and there is still a certain distance from the real establishment of a national industry supply chain collaboration platform. The interrelated technologies and progress among enterprises are still in the process. In the early days, it was more difficult to achieve free connectivity." Jiang Zhaosheng, a senior researcher at Okey Cloud Chain Research Institute, pointed out in an interview with a reporter from "China Electronics News".

Experts believe that China does not yet have the conditions to build a new national cross-industry supply chain coordination system. While requiring a lot of manpower, material resources, and financial resources, it also needs a blockchain infrastructure with excellent performance and many users. It takes a long time to explore, research and build.

The basis for forming a unified national market is to allow goods to flow smoothly and make the best use of them. To promote the smooth flow of commodity element resources in a wider range, open and shared data is the premise. The state proposes to regard data as an important factor of production, alongside land, labor, capital, and technology, and participate in distribution according to contribution. However, during the implementation process, it faces the pain point of "unable to share, unwilling to share, and afraid to share" data.

Liu Quan told reporters that from the current point of view, on the one hand, data resource standards are not uniform and cannot be shared. The data resource standards in the information systems established by various departments are not uniform, and it is very difficult to integrate information resources and carry out data sharing. On the other hand, the concept of data sharing in our country has not yet formed, leading to reluctance to share. The information systems of different levels, different regions, and different functional departments are all established through a series of processes such as research, adjustment, and design. They have the characteristics of "uniqueness and privacy" and are generally not easily shared with the outside world. In addition, issues such as privacy protection, authorized access, and difficulty in determining responsibility lead to fear of sharing. The extent, scope and objects of data sharing have yet to be further demonstrated, and the sharing authorization needs to be strengthened both technically and in management.

For the open system of data sharing, embedding the blockchain in it will build a scalable system, which is expected to solve the dilemma of insufficient incentives for data sharing in the construction of centralized databases today.

The "directory blockchain" system created by Beijing has become a model for data sharing in the industry, allowing data sharing to be encouraged and standards to follow. It is understood that Beijing uses the blockchain to efficiently and collaboratively link the responsibilities, directories, and data of 53 departments in the city, establishes unified standards and new rules for intergovernmental data, and solves the problem of data absence and offside. At the same time, relying on the "directory blockchain", the sharing relationship between departments and the process are locked on the chain, which solves the problems of random data flow and disordered business collaboration. In addition, a data sharing incentive mechanism has been established. The responsibilities of departments that do not provide data will be adjusted, and the systems that are not on the chain will be shut down. A new "closed loop" of departmental business, data, and duty performance will be established.

In the final analysis, the fear of sharing is the fear of data privacy leakage, which is also the most difficult and most critical part of open sharing. Liu Lichao said: "Blockchain combines privacy computing, which can provide protection for data sources to a large extent. In the process of data circulation, development and use, privacy computing helps hide plaintext, helps data use in compliance, and provides data for multi-party data collaboration. bring security."

At present, many companies that started with the blockchain have taken the blockchain + privacy computing as the core to build a distributed digital asset trading platform.

Hangzhou Qulian Technology Co., Ltd. regards "privacy computing + blockchain" as a new generation of data circulation, and introduces privacy computing into blockchain application scenarios such as joint marketing, anti-fraud, corporate credit investigation, and new drug research and development. Both are "indispensable" - the blockchain guarantees the accurate confirmation and value distribution of digital assets in multilateral cooperation, and privacy computing is data technology to ensure the security and compliance of digital asset transactions.

On the other hand, Ant Group cooperates with medical insurance, hospitals, health care, and medical device manufacturers to solve the problem of insufficient data volume and data richness in a single top-tier hospital based on a joint model built on the data of multiple hospitals, and significantly reduce the workload of medical insurance feedback analysis. decrease. Under the leadership of the health and construction department, Ant Group deployed privacy computing nodes in each hospital to ensure that a large amount of medical record data in the relevant departments of the tertiary hospitals can effectively improve the accuracy of the decision-making system through data training when the original data does not go out of the domain.