OREANDA-NEWS. Vnesheconombank’s Senior Vice-President for Information Technologies Nikita Smirnov took part in the conference entitled “Information Technologies of Industrial Russia-2017” (CIPR) traditionally held in the city of Innopolis, Kazan.

This year, most of the CIPR panel sessions focus on the Digital Economy and the programme of the same name being developed by the Russian Government. The discussions centered on the issues of developing digital economy in Russia, information security, the Internet of Things, and new management tools for economic and industrial processes, including blockchain solutions. The prospects and potential of the blockchain technology, as well as the challenges associated with its introduction in Russia were addressed during the Blockchain panel session. Among blockchain advantages, the panelists pointed out decentralization, distributed networking, trust and openness, speed, transparency, robustness and low price.

Speaking at the Blockchain panel session, Nikita Smirnov stated that VEB is involved, on the one hand, in the formulation of the Digital Economy government programme and on the other hand, seeks to boost process efficiency and introduce state-of-the-art technologies in the Bank.

“We are developing approaches to apply blockchain solutions within the Bank, in particular, in the investment project management and trade finance transactions. For these business lines, we have already launched two prototype process solutions being operated in the test mode. In the process of operating the Digital Contract process solution for investment project management, we have logged the first test transactions under digital investment contracts. We believe that subsequently this solution will find application in other areas,” Nikita Smirnov noted. “Obviously, the blockchain technology has its drawbacks, in particular, in terms of the identity management and data privacy. These aspects need to be thoroughly considered, thus making it possible for the system to protect the data and the participants. However, the implementation problems and difficulties are an inherent part of developing a new technology. The current processes may well be compared to a fundamental research,” Nikita Smirnov further said.

In his address, VEB’s top manager invited the panelists to pursue blockchain discussions on the sidelines of the SPIEF’17.