Target explores benefits of blockchain

Target is working on a blockchain-powered solution for supply chain management, dubbed ConsenSource. And it has also announced support for the Hyperledger Grid project.

The retailer is in the process of looking for a blockchain engineer and systems developer. “I’m proud that we will support the Hyperledger Grid project, and that we’re committing dedicated engineering resources to build out components in the Grid architecture,” Joel Crabb, Target’s Vice President of Architecture, wrote in a blog post.

He noted that in mid-2018, the company began a blockchain proof of concept to help manage the certification of suppliers in its own branded paper product manufacturing. “In working directly with the forest managers and certification boards, we learned that standing up a blockchain is simple from a technology standpoint, but difficult in deciding what data should live on the distributed ledger. This work on a certification blockchain was recently open sourced as ConsenSource,” Crabb said.

“As ConsenSource progressed, Cargill’s (one of Target’s suppliers) work in creating supply chain middleware to store data and transactions on a blockchain came to our attention. As we learned more about the effort, Cargill and Intel took the project to Hyperledger, an open source collaborative hosted by Linux Foundation, and it became Hyperledger Grid,” he added.

Crabb concluded: “Maturity in this space will take time, but we’ll only get there when enterprise partners like Target and Cargill dive in together.”