Siemens Is Considering Using Blockchain to Improve the Car Sharing Market

Siemens is following the trend of mainstream giants seeking to integrate blockchains. "We are developing industrial expansion products of blockchain system," Andreas kind, technical director of network security of Siemens, told me in an interview. The use cases mentioned above are related to supply chain, mobility, manufacturing and other fields.

Kind explained that when entities are interested in moving towards blockchain, they usually have to go through a period of testing and discovery before they can choose the most effective and applicable use cases. "Siemens is at this stage," he added. Kind said that the company has just completed a period of exploration. "Now we have really entered a set of use cases related to Siemens business." Kind pointed out that Siemens especially wants to obtain the use license of blockchain.

Blockchain in the mobile field

The director of network security and blockchain mentioned that the mobile field is one of the key applications of Siemens blockchain. Siemens has a separate branch in the mobile field. Siemens mobility, a subsidiary of Siemens AG in Germany, stated on its website that the company is committed to providing "transportation solutions" and integrating "people and goods" Shipped all over the world.

Car sharing as an option

Kind explained that people living or working in larger urban areas often rely on carpooling rather than undertaking some responsibilities related to owning a car, such as parking, car payment and insurance. According to the details on the enterprise carshare website, carpooling service allows users to rent a car at any time, even as short as an hour. Zipcar is another example of car sharing operation Son.

This is a huge change. So in the future, there will be more opportunities around mobile services, not just selling a car. You have seen it in the context of car sharing. People want to go from point a to point B, rather than owning a car and moving, because sometimes it is much more convenient than owning their own car.

As king specifically mentioned the "gas card", carpooling does have its difficulties. King said that in the car sharing subscription service, "you don't have to worry about paying parking fees or refueling your car, so all fees are included."

However, kind said that sometimes customers may need to refuel their cars. Finding a suitable gas station may be difficult because customers need to refuel at specific gas stations, which cooperate with companies sharing their cars. When customers find a place to refuel, they must use a gas card and attach the relevant personal identification number (PIN) with detailed instructions.

Kind pointed out: "this is not only inconvenient for drivers, but also inconvenient for companies, because gas cards will be stolen and sold on the Internet." he explained: "in an industrial environment, you need something, a technology that can bring together different participants who (do not) fully trust each other." "this is where blockchain can add value."

Car sharing and blockchain

King explained that sharing cars is an area where Siemens is considering integrating the blockchain. "In this area, blockchain provides a more frictionless way of transaction." he added: "transactions can be car delivery or (simple) carpooling." king also noted many interacting groups, such as brokers, organizations owning cars "Garage provider" and so on. Kind said: "all this should be completely seamless in the process of transaction. Blockchain is indeed a correct technology."

At Bosch's 2019 connected world conference, a representative of Siemens explained to me in an email that Siemens's enterprise technical team introduced in detail the concept of "Intelligent Parking Based on blockchain" as a possibility of using blockchain.