Walli Finance | Walliwali 40th live interview - Dialogue with Fan Jingang, founder of Liangguan Network

Host: Mr. Fan, could you please introduce yourself to your fans and the story between you and Liangguan Network?

Fan Jingang: Hello everyone, I am Fan Jingang, the founder and CEO of Liangguan Network. I also serve as the executive secretary-general of the Blockchain Committee of the China Information Association, the executive vice secretary-general of the Blockchain Branch of the China Electronics Society, the vice president of the Blockchain Branch of the China Group Company Promotion Association, and the dean of the China Practical Blockchain Research Institute, among other social positions.

The creation of Liangguan Network is due to the following aspects:

First, my work experience. I started studying blockchain in the second half of 2015, so I entered the industry relatively early. I established a basic judgment standard for blockchain technology, applications, and development. With the support of investors and the availability of relevant conditions, Liangguan Network was born.

The second is development opportunities. The development trend of the domestic blockchain industry experienced an important turning point in 2019. It can be said that blockchain technology has been "rectified" and the development of blockchain-related industries has been vigorously advocated;

The third is the proposition of the times. I have emphasized on many occasions that my country is often controlled by others in the traditional Internet technology environment. For example, in terms of traditional Internet standards, protocols, patents, etc., developed countries such as Europe and the United States dominate; blockchain technology has brought a new dawn of overtaking, and my country and foreign countries are basically on the same starting line in blockchain development.

The purpose of Liangguan Network Company is to devote itself to the innovative development of industrial blockchain. We provide one-stop solution services. Our business areas mainly include energy, medical care, government affairs, transportation, agriculture, finance, etc. Our customers include governments, central enterprises, public institutions and traditional enterprises that are in urgent need of digital transformation.

If you are interested in blockchain technology and applications, welcome to follow our official account "Liangguan Network". The pictures and texts include my original opinion articles, cutting-edge technology research, the latest policy trends and industry information, etc. You can also add my personal WeChat to communicate with me directly and learn and improve together.

Host: Blockchain and industrial blockchain are both big topics. Can you first introduce to everyone your understanding of blockchain and industrial blockchain?

Fan Jingang: First of all, we must make it clear that blockchain is a technical concept, and industrial blockchain is an application concept. To use an analogy, the two are like water and fish. Blockchain technology is the fish, and it can only burst out with wonderful vitality under the living water of application scenarios in various industries in society.

Secondly, blockchain is the core technology for the development of industrial blockchain, but it is not the only underlying technology. In the future, when industrial blockchain develops to a higher stage, it should be the integration and application of blockchain with information technologies such as 5G, IOT, and AI, and then transition from the information Internet to the value interconnection stage.

Finally, industrial blockchain is not a simple additive relationship, such as the logic of "blockchain + industry" or "industry + blockchain", but it is to build an innovative environment of technological integration under the background of new infrastructure, and promote the healthy and sustainable development of industrial blockchain by strengthening synergy in policies, capital, data, applications, ecology, industrial chain, talent system, etc.

Host: What are the main areas of industry application of blockchain at present?

Fan Jingang: At present, the application of blockchain has accelerated its penetration and development from the pan-financial field to various industries in the economic society. From the perspective of specific industries, blockchain is used in the fields of real economy, people's livelihood, smart cities, government services and interconnection. From the perspective of application scenarios, it is currently mainly supply chain management/finance, transaction verification, payment and settlement, traceability and anti-counterfeiting, title confirmation and evidence storage, electronic signature verification, data sharing, etc.

Since blockchain still has certain technical bottlenecks, such as capacity expansion, cross-chain, on-chain governance, etc., and has not yet formed common technical standards and application specifications, there is still some distance before blockchain can be applied on a large scale. Therefore, we need to look objectively at the future development potential and current role value of blockchain.

Moderator: In your opinion, what stage of development is the domestic industrial blockchain currently in? What are its highlights and shortcomings?

Fan Jingang: From the perspective of the evolution of blockchain technology, generally speaking, there are three important milestones in the development of blockchain, namely:

Blockchain 1.0 stage — programmable currency (birth of BTC)

Blockchain 2.0 stage - programmable finance (Ethereum debut)

Blockchain 3.0 stage - programmable society (industry-scale application)

Obviously, we have now entered the 3.0 stage.

However, from the perspective of blockchain application practice, we believe that it is necessary to go through four consensus stages, namely technical consensus, application consensus, industry consensus and governance consensus. Currently, we are experiencing the transition from application consensus to industry consensus.

Unlike foreign countries that focus on public chain technology research, my country's industrial blockchain development is more based on the actual industrial development and focuses on application innovation on the alliance chain. The reasons for this are both historical reasons for technological inheritance and objective differences in economic and social environments.

In general, my country's industrial blockchain is rapidly moving towards a path of healthy development. Compared with previous years, the public's overall awareness of blockchain technology and applications has reached a new height. This change is inseparable from the joint efforts of policy guidance, media communication and various training institutions; but at the same time, we must understand that blockchain is still a new technology and has not yet become a technical infrastructure to serve industrial development. There is still a long way to go in the future.

Moderator: In April this year, the National Development and Reform Commission clearly included blockchain in the list of new infrastructure. So what does new infrastructure mainly refer to? What impact will it have on the development of industrial blockchain?

Fan Jingang: Regarding my understanding of new infrastructure, I would like to explain it from the following aspects:

First, the background of the proposal. The concept of "new infrastructure" is not the first time this year. At the Central Economic Work Conference held in December 2018, it was first proposed to "accelerate the pace of 5G commercialization and strengthen the construction of new infrastructure such as artificial intelligence, industrial Internet, and Internet of Things." The concept of "new infrastructure" surfaced. On March 4 this year, the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee held a meeting and clearly emphasized the acceleration of the construction of new infrastructure such as 5G networks and data centers. "New infrastructure" was named again.

Second, the areas covered. After the central meeting, CCTV (CCTV-4) listed the seven major areas of "new infrastructure": 5G infrastructure, ultra-high voltage, intercity high-speed railways and urban rail transit, new energy vehicle charging piles, big data centers, artificial intelligence, and industrial Internet. So far, the term "new infrastructure" has been widely circulated.

The third is the main classification. On April 20, at the press conference of the National Development and Reform Commission, the official clarified the scope of "new infrastructure" for the first time, including information infrastructure, integrated infrastructure, and innovative infrastructure. Among them, information infrastructure is divided into three subcategories according to technical functions, namely communication network infrastructure (represented by 5G, Internet of Things, Industrial Internet, and Satellite Internet), new technology infrastructure (represented by artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and blockchain) and integrated infrastructure (such as intelligent transportation, smart energy, etc.).

From the above-mentioned conceptual analysis, we can see that the current main technologies of new infrastructure are mainly 5G, Internet of Things, Industrial Internet, artificial intelligence and big data centers, and the main industrial integration directions are electric energy, charging piles, rail transit and other fields. Therefore, it can be seen that the overall trend is moving towards ubiquitous interconnection and intelligent perception.

As a technology that reshapes the trust mechanism, blockchain still has huge room for imagination and development when integrated with related industries and technologies. With the increase in new infrastructure, the development of industrial blockchain will usher in a critical period of development opportunities, which can be seen from the fact that local governments have issued policy support documents related to blockchain.

Moderator: What does digital economy specifically refer to? Could you please introduce your understanding of digital economy?

Fan Jingang: The term "digital economy" first appeared in the 1990s. In 1995, the OECD elaborated on the possible development trend of the digital economy, believing that driven by the Internet revolution, human development will change from atomic processing to information processing. In 1996, Don Tapscott of the United States described the impact of the computer and Internet revolution on business behavior in his book "Digital Economy". In 1998, the US Department of Commerce's research report "The Emerging Digital Economy" described the development trend from industrial economy to digital economy driven by the diffusion and penetration of IT technology, and summarized the characteristics of the digital economy as "the Internet is the infrastructure, information technology is the leading technology, the information industry is the leading and pillar industry, and e-commerce is the engine of economic growth". In 2002, American scholar Beomsoo Kim defined the digital economy as a special economic form, pointing out that the essence of digital economic activities is "commodities and services are traded in the form of information technology". With the development and maturity of information technology and the continuous improvement of the digitalization of the economy and society, the connotation and scope of the "digital economy" have been further expanded on the basis of the early stage. In 2016, the G20 Digital Economy Development and Cooperation Initiative defined the digital economy as "a series of economic activities that use digital knowledge and information as key production factors, modern information networks as important carriers, and the effective use of information and communication technologies as an important driving force for improving efficiency and optimizing economic structure."

It can be seen that the digital economy is a higher economic stage after the agricultural economy and the industrial economy. In short, for the digital economy, data is the element, the network is the carrier, and the integration and transformation is the driving force. In terms of scope, the digital economy covers two aspects: digital industrialization and industrial digitization. Among them, digital industrialization mainly refers to the added value of the information industry, mainly including basic telecommunications, electronic information product manufacturing, software and information services, and the Internet industry. Industrial digitization includes the contribution of information technology to other industries (including agriculture, industry, and services).

The development of the digital economy, mainly through the continuous upgrading of network infrastructure (such as 5G, artificial intelligence, blockchain, Internet of Things, cloud computing, etc.) and information tools such as intelligent machines, has continuously enhanced human ability to process the quantity, quality and speed of big data, thereby promoting the transformation of human economic form from industrial economy to information economy, knowledge economy and smart economy.

Moderator: What can blockchain bring to the digital economy? Where does its greatest value lie?

Fan Jingang: The digital economy has initiated a disruptive transformation and profound and comprehensive change in the traditional industrial economy, becoming an important weight in the new round of comprehensive national strength competition among countries in the world.

The digital economy is an intelligent stage characterized by the deep mining and integrated application of blockchain, artificial intelligence and big data. It is a more advanced economic form that emerged after the agricultural economy and industrial economy. It is a process of mapping physical assets and digital assets to accelerate the aggregation of data resources and create the value of digital assets.

At present, data elements, like land, labor, capital and technology elements, have participated in labor distribution as production factors. In the digital economy era, the most core production factors are knowledge and data.

Blockchain is a credible carrier of small data. If the data in the digital age is not credible, then all digital construction is like a mirage. From a technical perspective, it is a high-level distributed computing paradigm and the prototype of a new generation of trusted cloud computing, with advantages such as free and open systems, highly credible data, fault tolerance and strong anti-attack capabilities. Blockchain technology is a credible technology for managing digital credentials in the digital age, and it is entirely possible that it will be closely related to the lives of each of us in the future.

Host: What is the biggest bottleneck in the process of industrial blockchain promoting the development of the digital economy?

Fan Jingang: The biggest bottleneck is how to find the right entry point and integration path. In the process of industrial blockchain promoting the development of digital economy, it is especially necessary to focus on data sharing and trusted governance to solve the core propositions in the development of industrial blockchain. At the same time, it is also necessary to develop and improve the industrial ecology and form a general application consensus, industrial consensus and governance consensus on the basis of technical consensus. In addition, the premise of realizing industrial blockchain is the digitization of the real economy. If the traditional real economy does not have the basic construction of digitization and does not introduce big data collection and analysis, it is almost impossible to directly introduce blockchain technology.

Host: What do you think about the legal and regulatory issues corresponding to the development of blockchain technology?

Fan Jingang: Although the application of blockchain technology has its natural advantages, it has brought great convenience to various industries and social members in various fields of application. However, due to its decentralized characteristics, its innovative and subversive power, its own rules will inevitably conflict and contradict with existing social rules and national legal rules. It is precisely because of conflicts and contradictions, risks and problems that it can stimulate motivation and imagination, including the motivation and imagination of society, the country and individuals. In view of the lag of the law and the universality of the actual applicability of blockchain technology, the current laws should also make corresponding adjustments and changes to adapt to the new social lifestyle. During this year's two sessions, several representatives mentioned that the country should pay attention to the supervision and legislation of new technologies such as blockchain.

Based on this premise, blockchain, like other information technologies, is currently still in the stage of industry self-discipline development. Moreover, since blockchain is still in its early stages of development, innovation and exploration within the regulatory framework is a more pragmatic choice.

Host: What are your prospects for the future of blockchain and its applications?

Fan Jingang: Blockchain is a great integrated innovative technology, which is fundamentally different from pure tool-oriented technologies such as 5G, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things, and big data. Its real technical value lies in the transformation of production relations and the reconstruction of trust mechanisms. To truly realize this vision, the most important thing at present is to deeply tackle the core technology of blockchain and understand the application essence of blockchain-enabled industries.

Although blockchain technology is still facing negative problems such as security, efficiency and resource issues at this stage, we still have reason to believe that in the near future, blockchain technology will enter thousands of households and become a universal technology for convenient life. Blockchain platformization will form a city chain network, blockchain componentization will form a component service network, and blockchain integration will form a digital technology operating system.

In short, the application of blockchain is the future development trend. It can not only become an emerging technology for future financial infrastructure, but also has good prospects in many fields.

Host: Thank you to Mr. Fan Jingang, founder and CEO of Liangguan Network, for participating in and supporting this live interview of Walli Finance!

Finally, I would like to thank all the strategic media partners for their strong support for this live interview with Wall-E Finance (in no particular order): Hexun Blockchain, Mars Finance, Block Technology, PANews, Gyro Finance, coinvoice, chain node, world chain finance, coin world, ostrich blockchain, Blocklike, Lieyun Finance, chain circle, TokenClub, Interstellar Vision, Coin Xiaobai, DAPPX, preaching finance, mustard circle, Milin Finance, Art Creation Times, Zero Degree Finance, SOSOLX, Lianxiang Finance, Bo Chain Finance, Ant Chain Finance, Honglian Finance, Crypto Valley, Chain Digital Technology, Beibo, Hot Chain Global Information, Fast Chain Headlines, Digging Coins, Zhongben Finance, Chain Zhuge Finance, 41 Finance, Changqing Finance, First Stop Finance, Duomi Finance, Mai Yaobang, Haixing Block, Miyou Finance, Golden Fruit, Zhongyue Finance, 3 Points Finance, Star Media, The strong support from Liantuan Finance, Maitian Finance, BTC123, Lianhu Finance, BiMaWen, Yunhe Finance, BiYongbao, Lian'an Finance, Curvature Zone, Anypay, BiNiuniu, Coordinate Information, Shililang Finance, Ear Finance, Aituopu, CoinON, Distinction, Currency Finance, Magnetic Chain Finance, Labajun, Lianbao, BiTang International, Crypto Finance, Bit Finance, Blockchain Bus, GoodBP, Guapi said, Chain Homesick, Addiction, FN.com, Daxia Blockchain, Land-based Study Society, Godfather Finance, Beta Club, Chain Game Players, New Finance, Mokr Headlines, Bull Market Business School, Block Dragon Gate Array, Chain Investment Finance, Sound of the Waves, Liandu.com, Beishu Blockchain, Feiyun said, Fulcrum Interview, Yideng Community, Lanben Finance, Wansha Information, Liandaodao, Black Hole Blockchain, Mo Engine, Coin Circle Hua Ge, Lianniu Finance, Hubox, and Fenglin Finance!

We would also like to thank Qun TV, Beep, and Biben Live for providing technical support for this live interview!