September 6, 2019
Way forward to a more female IT: our third Blockchain Conference “#moinblockchain” by moinworld
Moinblockchain’19- Our speakers introduce themselves: Natalie Tillack
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At this year’s moinblockchain conference on October 18th, many inspiring speakers will be present. We already asked in advance where our speakers got their enthusiasm for Blockchain from and why the topic has a lot of potential for the future. Today we introduce you to Natalie Tillack. She is the managing director of DenkFabrik.io, a Berlin-based consulting firm that develops market entry strategies for Blockchain in industry, business and education. There, application cases and investment theses are developed for companies without blockchain development as well as for selected blockchain companies. Natalie holds a PhD in Computer Aided Physics from Oxford University and a PhD in 2016. She then joined McKinsey & Company as an Associate, driving digital projects and leading pro bono consulting projects for the German start-up ecosystem. At the conference she will give a lecture on “Best practices in executing large-scale blockchain implementations”.
Dear Natalie, what do you like about Blockchain?
As managing director of DenkFabrik.io, I focus on closing the gap between Blockchain and our everyday life and applying it successfully and meaningfully for Blockchain as a technology. For companies and investors without a Blockchain focus, the whole process starts with Executive Education, continues with the development of possible market entry strategies for companies and investors - even if this means that Blockchain does not (yet) have top priority - and extends to the execution and mediation of the right partners - be it for implementation, partnership, marketing or acquisition. On the other hand, we advise selected companies in the blockchain area with regard to strategy. As soon as a functioning product exists, the following questions must be asked, as with all digital products: What is my Product-Market Fit? My go-to-market strategy? How do I quickly and agilely find out what makes us special and what niche we should focus on? This is very relevant as the blockchain industry is becoming more professional. Both the non-blockchain companies and the investors have to take a stand. But also the blockchain companies have to take the next entrepreneurial step from pure tech development and so far we can generate real added value. Due to the high demand, we currently publish our insights in a toolkit that illuminates every facet of a blockchain project along the entire value chain from strategy and tech development to implementation and marketing. At the same time, this ensures that best practices are adhered to and that the best known mistakes are not made.
…and how did you come to the topic “Blockchain”?
There are several reasons for this: the absolutely new technical solution to a long-known problem, the fascination it triggers on the Tekkie side worldwide, the interesting history of the technology and the variety of its applications. I’m really excited about which parts of our lives Blockchain will influence. No matter whether in the next 1 to 2, or also in the next 10 to 20 years. Let’s compare the Blockchain technology to where the internet was with its first website in 1991 - a blank page with a table and 10 links - this is comparable to the state of Blockchain today, about 11 years after the technology with the Crypto currency Bitcoin was first released. Today, not even 20 years later, the Internet has become part of our everyday lives and its applications were unthinkable at that time: IoT, mobile data, apps, over, Amazon… So, no matter how fascinating the technology behind Blockchain is, I’m also excited about the possibilities and, most importantly, where the next few years will take us. I myself am in the heart of Tekkie - I did my doctorate in computer-aided physics and developed algorithms for highly parallel computing of electron systems at both the Max Planck Institute and Oxford. I had my first contact with the business side of Blockchain in 2017. At that time I published a compendium on digital disruptions in the insurance industry at McKinsey and in the framework of this compendium I examined topics ranging from customer centricity to analytics, IoT, artificial intelligence and blockchain. After that, I continued to research the topic, especially application cases. I have noticed that there is a great need for people who are familiar with both strategic issues and the implementation of large-scale projects in a very complex technology.
Why do you think Blockchain is important for the future?
Blockchain as a technology has grown up. The initial hype has subsided and the industry has also recovered from the “Valley of Disillusionment” - all a lá Gartner and his Hype Cycle. Just as the news about “overnight billionaires” and 6,000% return on investments are becoming rarer, so will the news about scams or about companies that advertise Blockchain as PR just because of its name as a general-purpose weapon - and let it trickle away in the sand after unsuccessful pilot projects. Instead, we are seeing more and more projects - from blockchain companies to large corporations that have matured strategically and are showing success: Walmart is constantly increasing the number of products tracked on a blockchain, Estonia ensures the security of its citizens’ health and identity data via blockchain, AXA’s Fizzy is used to take out insurance policies that automatically pay out amounts if my flight is delayed, and major players in the financial industry acknowledge that they have been running large portions of their FX transactions via blockchain architectures for years. These solutions, i.e. the “simple” replacement of existing database structures by a blockchain solution, have already been relatively well understood and are used. But also beyond that first successful conversions of novel business models show up. From Blockchain as a Service and incentive systems to the tokenization of previously illiquid assets such as real estate, the industry shows that Blockchain - even if in the future - has a much higher potential than simply reducing the costs of internal processes.
Many thanks to Natalie Tillack for this inspiring contribution! We are delighted to have such great support and are counting the days leading up to the conference! Your moinworld Team
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