The goal of Hyperledger FireFly is to make it easier to launch enterprise blockchain projects by providing all the tools and frameworks needed for a project beyond the blockchain itself. Today Hyperledger announced the availability of code for the FireFly SuperNode, which doesn’t just provide a blockchain node, but all the other code and tools that are often installed or developed by each project. The impact is to save significant developer time.
Initially developed by Kaleido, which open-sourced the code last year, the platform has been deployed by three groups: the RiskStream Collaborative for insurance, the Synaptic Health Alliance, and TradeGo, the commodities trade finance group.
FireFly is compatible with the three major blockchains used by corporates, Ethereum, Hyperledger Fabric, and R3’s Corda. In the case of Ethereum, it supports multiple flavors, including private blockchains and the public mainnet. Corda is a little less mature than the other two.
Typically in enterprise blockchain projects, what gets stored on the blockchain is often just a hash of other data. The data not on the blockchain has to be stored somewhere and shared in a privacy-preserving manner. Just for that, you might need an identity system for the purpose of permissions, a shared storage system, and APIs to connect to the internal enterprise system. But there’s quite a bit more functionality on offer as part of FireFly.
At its core, a SuperNode provides all the open-source middleware that’s needed between your application and the underlying blockchain.
“Our business was looking for multi-protocol support to manage risk and maximize opportunity for our member organizations,” said Pat Schmid, VP of The Institutes RiskStream Collaborative. “FireFly’s technology helped us achieve that objective.”
