Etihad Airways enters Blockchain with Winding Tree

Blockchain is famous for its many possible applications and this has been applied to the supply chain industry, the fashion industry, the sports industry and so on. One application that does not quite receive as much attention as the others is its use within the travel and transportation industry as the use of blockchain can be applied for the keeping of vital records with regards to travel and also in helping to curate the travel experience for consumers.

It has now been announced on August 8, 2019, that Etihad Airways, the national carrier of the United Arab Emirates, has partnered with the Winding Tree, a blockchain-based platform to explore how blockchain can help in distribution.

Up in the Air

This sort of development has been in progress for quite a while as the Winding Tree has partnered with several airlines such as Air Canada, Air France KLM, and Lufthansa to deploy blockchain for the improvement of services as well as keeping of inventory that regards their customers. The benefit of this is that transportation costs can be reduced through the use of blockchain and this benefits both the airline and the final consumer.

According to Tristan Thomas, the director of digital and Innovation at Etihad, the Winding tree is a platform that allows for the disruption of the traditional siloed market which is usually dominated by major distribution systems and offers an alternative to airlines.

There was also some input from Pedro Anderson, who is the chief operating officer of the Winding Tree who stated that consumers will be the ones who benefit the most from this development.

“We have been doing experiments and new solutions on the platform. Ultimately, that benefits the consumer. When there’s innovation, you start to have disruption, you have competition which results in better prices for the consumer,” he said. 

The application of blockchain for airlines is being heavily explored at the moment in order to improve on existing systems such as with Cathay Pacific, which is Hong Kong flagship airline who made use of blockchain to manage unit load devices with the end goal of eliminating paper-based processes by making use of a blockchain application that will facilitate the management of these processes through small devices like smartphones which in turn saves time effort and Resources.

This shows that blockchain is developing is user base outside of cryptocurrency which is the most famous product.