3FOOD

Third Industrial Revolution Consulting Group
usher in sweeping new efficiencies globally by cutting out middlemen and empowering endusers
and start-up innovators. Blockchain solutions are now being applied to everything from
the real-time supply of renewable energy resources at the neighbourhood level, to settlement
of stocks and bonds and the copyrighting of digital music.
The Blockchain is a breakthrough that heralds the Internet’s next evolutionary phase and
provides the best existing technology case for effectively realizing the Third Industrial
Revolution. The first Internet phase, led by the development of the World Wide Web in the
1990s, vastly decentralized communication, while providing unprecedented access to
information. But it left in place an uneven playing field dominated by gatekeepers that meant
that inefficiencies and a lack of interoperability persisted, especially in finance, all because the
Internet could not solve society’s dependence on a centralized system of trust. In this second,
blockchain-led phase, developers are building the so-called “Internet of Value,” a system of
peer-to-peer information exchange founded on a distributed trust network within a distributed
and decentralized system of governance. The Blockchain is generating new paradigms of trust
and accountability and it is evolving into a borderless, ownerless architecture upon which
myriad new applications will be based.
Luxembourg is uniquely positioned to exploit this ground breaking technology. Sitting in the
middle of Europe and having already established itself as a financial powerhouse, the country
has an opportunity to grab a global leadership role in the Blockchain’s development. By moving
early, it can bring efficiencies to its own economy, helping to reverse a worrying decline in totalfactor
productivity and competitiveness. As discussed later, it can then export that knowledge
and related services to Europe and the rest of the world, dramatically scaling up the well-being
of Luxembourg citizens.
Luxembourg’s strong digital foundation also works to its advantage. With penetration of
ultrafast broadband and Internet usage among the highest in the world, there’s greater
potential for the network effects needed for the blockchain to succeed. Critically, the country
enjoys a disproportionately large population of highly trained software developers, with the
University of Luxembourg hosting a renowned school of cryptology – the discipline that lies at
the heart of all blockchain design. The Luxembourg School of Business has already hosted a
“blockchain bootcamp” to stir interest in the field. The ongoing development of this technology
will ensure that the world’s top cryptographers will constantly be in short supply. However,
Luxembourg is not alone in these global efforts and must act quickly to gain advantage.
But there is work ahead. A KPMG Luxembourg survey, as but one example, found that only 17
percent of asset management CEOs are worried about disruptive technologies such as the
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