The growing popularity of cryptocurrency has led to a revolution in the digital currency industry. Enterprises that were of noncrypto origin now have or plan to have their own crypto product. The 10 years of cryptocurrency’s existence has led to an unprecedented ease of transactions. It has also brought transparency into the e-commerce world. This article discusses 10 of the biggest enterprises in the world, without a cryptocurrency background, that have already created or are in the process of investing resources to develop a digital currency they can call their own. 1. Facebook Facebook is reportedly completing efforts to release …

Amazon is looking to hire a software development engineer to develop an advertisement blockchain. Amazon works on an advertising blockchain Amazon posted a job offer on LinkedIn for a software development engineer for its Colorado team, who is supposed to work on an advertisement blockchain. The online retail behemoth aims to grow its advertisement business by leveraging its online retail data, industry-leading cloud services, and a fast-moving startup culture. The post declares: “Our new team in Boulder, CO is looking for a Sr Software Engineer to work within our Advertising FinTech team focused on a Blockchain ledger, billing and reconciliation …

Tim Wagner, the vice president of engineering at major cryptocurrency platform Coinbase, is reportedly leaving the company. Wagner will purportedly leave Coinbase within the next two weeks, according to a report by CoinDesk on July 30. An unnamed spokesperson for the company is said to have confirmed Wagner’s departure with the news outlet. At press time, Tim Wagner is currently still listed as VP Engineering at Coinbase on his LinkedIn profile. Previous roles at Microsoft and Amazon As previously reported by Cointelegraph, Coinbase initially hired Wagner last August. Wagner previously worked for Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft before joining …

Bitcoin (BTC) recovered more swiftly from its bear cycles than Amazon did during the boom and bust of the dot com era, data from crypto analytics firm Messari reveals. Bitcoin’s 2019 breakout ‘extremely bullish’ by comparison Fellow industry analytics firm Ceteris Paribus shared Messari’s findings in a tweet on July 17: “The latest $BTC cycle mirrors $AMZN during the dot-com bubble, but the recovery has been much more swift. Even with the recent sell off, bitcoin is 54% down from its high, vs. the 85% Amazon was trading at over a similar timeframe.” Bitcoin and Amazon ‘bubbles’ comparison, 2015-2019. Courtesy …

Major global firms Fidelity, Deloitte and Amazon have begun supporting a new blockchain accelerator program called Startup Studio, according to a press release on July 11. The companies are backing the program along with 20 other firms, including Ethereum Foundation and ETH Global, Stellar Foundation, crypto analytics firm Messari, and Coinbase-backed NEAR Protocol, among the others. The new blockchain accelerator is an initiative of IDEO CoLab Ventures, the venture capital division of global design consultancy firm IDEO. Supported by Fidelity, Deloitte and Amazon, as well as major crypto industry players, Startup Studio is set up to provide workshops to blockchain …

United States-based payments startup Fold has made Lightning Network (LN) payments possible at Amazon, Starbucks, Uber and other big name retailers. The news was revealed in an official blog post published on July 10. As previously reported, the Bitcoin (BTC) Lightning Network is a second-layer solution to bitcoin’s scalability limitations, opening payment channels between users that keep the majority of transactions off-chain, turning to the underlying blockchain only to record the net results. In its announcement, Fold reveals that participating selected retailers will settle users’ LN payments — denominated in satoshis, or one hundred millionth of one Bitcoin — via …

A peer-to-peer Bitcoin marketplace that offers more than 300 ways to buy Bitcoin has announced it is being integrated into BitMart, a global digital asset trading platform. Paxful enables its users to purchase Bitcoin using bank transfers, debit cards, online wallets like PayPal and an array of gift cards — including well-known brands such as Amazon, iTunes, Google Play and Steam Wallet. Many of these payment methods enable consumers to access the cryptocurrency instantly. The platform has now entered into a joint venture with BitMart, a digital asset trading platform with a global user base of more than 700,000 people, …

Only a “very, very tiny percentage” of this month’s 1,700 job losses at IBM affected its blockchain division, The Block reported on June 20. Jerry Cuomo, the vice president of IBM Blockchain Technology, told the website that the tech giant is prioritizing blockchain skills when making hiring and firing decisions — adding it was “full steam ahead” for his department. The layoffs have been described as a “realignment plan.” The consulting arm of IBM’s blockchain business experienced some losses of redundant positions, but its engineering side reportedly escaped unscathed. A source told The Block: “The product team had no layoffs, …

Two different books published under Satoshi Nakamoto’s name have recently appeared on Amazon. According to Amazon, both of the books — Wave and Ripple Design Book and The Official Bitcoin Coloring Book — are scheduled for release on June 28. The profile of the author makes it clear that he indeed claims to be the same Satoshi Nakamoto who created bitcoin (BTC): “Satoshi Nakamoto is the renowned inventor of Bitcoin.” The author’s profile also states that “100% of his book royalties to support STEM and environmental education programs serving underprivileged youth.” The store descriptions of the books themselves seemingly contain …

Amazon would only consider discussing the creation of its own cryptocurrency like Facebook’s Libra in several years’ time, a senior executive said at a conference on June 10. Speaking at Fortune’s Brainstorm Finance 2019 event, Patrick Gaulthier, vice president of Amazon Pay, said the kind of value transfer system Facebook unveiled this week was a step too far in the current climate. “It’s fresh, it’s speculative; at Amazon, we don’t really deal with the speculative, in the now,” he said. Facebook continues to cause a stir in cryptocurrency, financial and government circles in the wake of the first publicity material …

MetLife subsidiary LumenLab is using blockchain technology to automate life insurance claims, according to a news release published on June 17. Known as “Lifechain,” the collaboration with Singapore Press Holdings and NTUC Income will enable bereaved families who place obituaries in a local newspaper to instantly trigger searches to see whether their loved one had a life insurance policy. This month, 1,000 Income policyholders will be randomly selected to take part in a pilot scheme. The technology works by submitting the deceased’s National Registration Identity Card to Lifechain as hashed data once consent from the family has been obtained. Families …

Blockchain software firm Digital Asset has partnered with Amazon Web Services (AWS) Aurora to make its open-source smart contract language Digital Asset Modeling Language (DAML) more interoperable. The partnership was revealed in a press release acquired by a Cointelegraph correspondent at the IMN Synchronize Europe Conference in London on June 18. The partnership will enable multi-platform DAML support for various blockchain networks, notably including Hyperledger Fabric and blockchain consortium R3’s Corda, both specifically cited in the press release. Introduced in April 2016, DAML is an expressive language designed for financial institutions and enterprises to model and execute agreements through distributed …