From 16 to 21 November, the SeaRates development team from the Ukrainian Branch actively participated as the main guest speaker at the Bytom Devcom 2018 conference, where developers from different countries competed in the ability to adapt the infrastructure of the decentralized Bytom registry in real life, as well as drafting of Smart Contracts, which would cover various branches of business. The most important example of adaptation was international transport market.
Prehistory
As we wrote in a separate article (which was also highlighted in Forbes), SeaRates’ collaboration with the DLT project Bytom began earlier this summer. Since China has a significant impact on the global economy and occupies a leading position in global logistics in terms of traffic volumes, and is also the number one exporter in the world - all this has led to a strategic development trend for the company's blockchain division towards China.
Bytom was the organizer of the conference for developers, where there was a place to mention the successful experience of implementing digital contracts and payments in the world of transport.
Greeting
Not only the conference itself, but the whole meeting was prepared in the best traditions of Chinese hospitality. Starting from the 40-storey hotel and the selected location to the very end and check-out from the last hotel - at every step we were met with care, attention, an infinite amount of hot tea and exotic treats. The atmosphere of Chinese order and discipline was felt from the airport in Beijing (where the transfer was), to Hangzhou and back.
Thanks to the brilliant work of the organizers, the whole stay was as comfortable and productive as possible. Despite a certain jet lag and fatigue after a 20-hour flight, the next day of the presentation promised to be rich and very interesting.
Most of all, we were excited by the realization that we are in a country that is the main exporting state with the largest production in the world, an economic giant, the birthplace of hundreds of thousands of high-quality transport companies, as well as the manufacturers and traders behind them. Today, these guys are breaking out into the digital era, and are beginning to have an immeasurable impact on global business processes.
Of all the peculiar phenomena in China, the language barrier was probably the most tangible for us. They by and large do not care who you are and where you are from. For them, there are no international languages of communication, world norms and cultural patterns. If you arrived to China - then you arrived to them, then if you please adapt to the local culture. Speak their language, if you need something, adjust to them. The Chinese put their culture, traditions and language above all. And although in reality they are very adequate to the guests, respectfully and courteously - we have not met a single taxi driver who speaks English. In international hotels designed for foreign guests, the reception does not speak English. What is really there - even in the hall during the conference, with the availability of opportunities and interpreters, no one gave us headphones with simultaneous translation: they say whatever you want and understand, get used to it! But the blessing for us - Iris Shen was with us from morning till night, and her level of English would give odds to Europeans.
Even among advanced IT community, apparently, only about 30-40% of the audience spoke English. True, they still singled out a translator for themselves, and our speaker Stefan spent a whole hour preparing with him in advance, explaining the subtleties and terminology of world logistics and SeaRates strategy. Edward turned out to be a capable guy and grasped everything on the fly, so that during the speech everything went smoothly and the people appreciated.
The Conference
Broadcasting of all conference days with more than 500 people was going live (the recording can be viewed here; the subject of logistics rose from 395 to 415 minutes). We were able to observe the revival of the public when the topic moved from dry statistics, numbers and theory to why it is important to introduce distributed registry technologies to a real way of changing business practices in a particular industry. Here’s how it was:
Exactly an hour after that, at the end of the conference, a decent amount of Chinese gathered together with the Greeks and Hindus who arrived. Apparently, the subject turned out to be very lively and interesting for them, and not everyone knew what achievements in this area already exist.
It is worth noting that the majority of the entire audience did not relate to the transport or trade sphere (except representatives of Alibaba), which could not but rejoice, because in 20 minutes they were able to understand what was going on and how it would reform the global supply chain.
Progressive Chinese IT-Community. Alibaba & Cainiao
As Sergey Dzhashitov mentioned in his post, such meetings become consistent when constantly hitting one point. SeaRates has a large team of developers and programmers with more than 10 years of experience, using the most advanced approaches in coding, which has implemented more than 3,000 projects; The company's product portfolio, services and capabilities are very broad, including the creation of entire web-sites with integrated IT-products. But we never took on sites and projects that are not dedicated to logistics or international trade - no matter how big the budgets were. We have always known that this approach will lead to the desired results, which is actually happening.
Our tasks are unchanged, and we know that the day will surely come when the entire world community of shipping and trading changes, learns to share information in a new way and effectively interact with each other for the sake of one common goal. Synergy is a whole that is greater than the sum of its separate parts.
Hangzhou
It is noteworthy that it is the city of Hangzhou that is today called the Silicon Valley of China. This is not Shanghai, not Beijing, not Guangzhou, with their outstanding differences; but few know what Jack Ma, the richest man in China, and one of the richest people in the world, was born in Hangzhou, which, together with hundreds of startups and the infrastructure of the city itself, makes it one of the most technologically advanced ones. It is Hangzhou where the headquarters of Alibaba, the largest trading platform with a capitalization of over $ 500 billion, is located, as well as Cainiao, formerly known as China Smart Logistics Network, is the largest logistics company with elements of network and digital technology.
And also Hangzhou is considered the tea capital of the country. Besides, the city has the most beautiful lake in all of China - Lake Xihu (West Lake); a famous pagoda stands on it, which is also a local landmark.
More photos from the place https://www.instagram.com/lxxmng/
The singing fountain in the middle of the lake is almost as big as the world famous fountain in Bellagio. Very beautiful sight, forcing to stop and look.
In general, the city leaves a positive impression with its modernity and proper rigor. There are no homeless people on the streets of Hangzhou, there’s enough police, in the same time you don’t feel depressed. Nobody is idle. Everyone is working, and even the cleaners do their work as if their lives depend on it. Everything is very clean and tidy, all the trees are trimmed, all the taxi drivers have meters and everything is properly organized. Construction is proceeding at an enormous pace, entire residential arrays are being built at a time. And although people in China are probably too serious and do not smile - we should learn a lot from them.
Future perspectives
China has opened its doors to digital logistics in a new way. The best teams pay attention to solve the problem of smart contracts and increase the speed of transactions, the level of security and reduce commissions on international payments. In addition, thousands of transport and trading companies realize that they are using their business opportunities to a maximum of 10%, although the potential for sales growth and penetration into new markets (both goods and transport services) is enormous.
The SeaRates team returned from a conference with several significant contracts for the future development of the project in China, and also received support from local IT companies in developing and improving the infrastructure of online booking and international payments for goods and services.
If you have something to tell us - we are open, write to [email protected] and perhaps it is your company that will discover something new for yourself, your region or even your country.
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