Blockchain – a bursting bubble or disruptive transformation? The Internet has created digital marketplaces that efficiently bring supply and demand together. The success of tech giants such as Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon, but also Tencent and Alibaba, can be largely explained by their two-sided digital marketplaces and the resulting platform economy. The platform companies seem to be growing inexorably due to the increasing marginal utility of their marketplaces. However, the development of distributed ledger technologies (DLTs) such as blockchain is now putting the tech giants themselves under pressure. DLTs connect the market participants directly and thus circumvent the platform company as an intermediary while also avoiding their excessive transaction fees. The winners are the directly value-creating parties.
Blockchain mainly became known through Bitcoin with all its ups and downs. Over the past few years, initial coin offerings (ICOs) created another wave of attention. But while media perceptions follow the trend, the true revolution usually takes place in secret. The establishment of the Internet was also initially characterized by short-term, speculation-driven overcapitalization before the sustainable implementation of the new technology and a lasting change in competition produced companies such as Google, Amazon, Facebook, and Alibaba. This article discusses how the platform economy can be disrupted by DLTs.
The platform economy is based on the establishment of digital two-sided marketplaces. As an intermediary, a platform company connects two market participants. For Uber, these are, for example, drivers and passengers. The platform operator receives a transaction fee for matching the two market players. Central to the success of platform companies is the growing marginal utility of a network: the more drivers register for Uber, the more attractive the platform is for passengers. More passengers, in turn, attract more drivers. The network effects described here lead to transparency and reduced transaction costs. At the same time, however, these
