Dr. Cathy Barrera, Founding Economist for Prysm Group discusses how we can advance blockchain technology at Converge2Xcelerate Conference (Boston, MA)

HIGHLIGHTS

• Prysm Group is a research driven economic consulting firm at the cutting edge of blockchain & distributed ledger technology
• Dr. Barrera is an advisor to blockchain projects at the World Economic Forum, MIT, & is a frequent keynote speaker on economics & DLT
• Blockchain technology in healthcare market expected to reach $42.1 million by 2023

(ESG News) – Cathy Barrera, Founding Economist of Prysm Group, left academia to make a difference, specifically with blockchain technology. 

“It’s nice working with students who are going to get out there and change the world. But sometimes you want to dig in yourself,” Barrera told Ed Kim, host of the Traders Network Show at the Converge2Xcelerate Conference in Boston. “Blockchain is at a moment when it can use a lot of help…to try to push the technology forward. And the industry is really lacking in folks with my type of skillset.” 

Prysm Group is a research-driven economic consulting firm at the forefront of blockchain technology. 

Barrera told Kim that more education on blockchain is needed. 

“It’s essentially a shared database that can be used by a group of entities who want to work together to coordinate on this data,” she said. “One of the main applications that we saw get a lot of hype in 2017 was cryptocurrencies, but there are many reasons why we might want to use a shared database, and we need to figure out how to get those folks together to coordinate on this data. And that requires economics.” 

She said advancing the use of blockchain will require better marketing, as well as building secure systems and creating the right incentives that motivate people to use it. 

“We need to provide the right cost and benefit set—the right incentive so that this technology provides [users] with more than what they could get elsewhere. And that really depends on how the specific system is designed,” Barrera said. “I think usability is certainly a big issue that needs to be overcome. But, really, I think each of the blockchain platforms needs to be designed very carefully so it can achieve its goals. Incentives don’t happen automatically.”