This is a guest contribution by Jasmine Solana, Associate Editor at CoinGeek.com. She interviews nChain CEO David Washburn, who explains that he doesn’t expect businesses to hire or become Bitcoin experts. Instead, they can turn to nChain for help. This article first appeared on CoinGeek.com.
Bitcoin is dead. It’s died more than a hundred times—if you believe the mainstream media, that is. The digital currency and blockchain industries, however, are far from dead; just take a look at the job market.
According to data from job search engine Indeed, job postings in the Bitcoin space jumped 1,457% during the September 2015-September 2019 period. LinkedIn also rated blockchain as the top “hard skill”—aka a skill companies need most—in 2020.
Blockchain “is the most in-demand skill in the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Australia,” according to the job site.
For David Washburn, CEO of enterprise-grade public solutions provider nChain, “the battle for experienced talent” will soon intensify as the blockchain industry enters its next phase of growth and the “huge demand for enterprise-grade solutions” comes in.
Giving nChain a massive head start in the so-called “battle for experienced talent” was the recent acquisition of CREA, a European software development, and implementation firm. The move follows “a history of successful collaboration” between the two firms. nChain and CREA have worked on some Bitcoin SV infrastructure projects, which, according to nChain, “form the basis” for its proprietary blockchain solutions.
“Often, the best acquisitions follow a history of successful collaboration. nChain and CREA have already worked together to deliver several mission-critical BSV projects. Through that work, we came to see that the CREA team is not only best in class technically, but that they also share our strategic vision for long-term success with BSV,” Washburn said.
The acquisition paves the way for the creation of one of the largest Bitcoin development teams in the world—with a headcount of over 120. Washburn told us:
Having CREA on board doesn’t change the milestones of our roadmap, but it will certainly accelerate our speed to reach each one of them. Adding the entire CREA team gives us more resources to develop the tools our current enterprise clients are demanding, and deliver them to market faster.
nChain’s work doesn’t stop there. The European company, which holds over 1,000 patent applications, is already gearing up for the blockchain industry’s “next phase of growth.”
“Enterprises around the globe are different in myriad ways, but the one thing that seems universal right now is interest in capturing the value of blockchain for business. Those companies are chomping at the bit, but still held in the gate, due to the lack of real products and services that offer value today to risk-averse organizations,” Washburn said. “nChain’s products overcome these challenges and are easily integrated. Our inbound inquiries have never been higher, and this is just the beginning.”
He added:
Experienced Bitcoin developers are in scarce supply globally. We believe that the future isn’t enterprise clients struggling and competing to build costly internal teams to develop BSV-based solutions. Rather, we see them partnering with us at nChain to ensure that the products and tools they need are always in the hands of the undeniable leaders of the space.
It will be exciting to watch what nChain builds out for its clients over the next several months now that they have secured the talent they need to help push the entire industry forward.
