Today IDC published its latest blockchain spending forecast, estimating that 2021 spending will reach $6.6 billion, a 50% increase on last year. It expects to see a five year compound growth rate of 48% per annum which means nearly $19 billion is forecast for 2024 blockchain spending.
“This is an important time in the blockchain market as enterprises across markets and industries continue to increase their investment in the technology. The pandemic highlighted the need for more resilient, more transparent supply chains, healthcare delivery, financial services, and so much more, and enterprises around the world have been investing in blockchain to provide that resiliency and transparency,” said IDC’s James Wester.
“What is also very important right now is that we are seeing real interest and investment by corporations, financial institutions, and even governments in areas they previously viewed with some uncertainty such as cryptocurrencies, digital assets, central bank digital currencies, decentralized finance, and stablecoins. This investment will have major implications in a very short time on everything from retail to financial services to capital markets.”
The major use cases attracting the most spend are similar to last year, with cross-border payments and settlements attracting the biggest chunk, followed by lot lineage and provenance, and trade finance & post trade in the third spot. Trade finance is a slightly lower proportion, moving from second to third spot. Given the pandemic, it’s not entirely surprising that there’s an increased proportion of spend on lot lineage.
In terms of industry sectors, banking is the largest, accounting for 30% of spend and is expected to stay the leading sector over the next four years, although its proportion will decline a little. Process manufacturing and discreet manufacturing come second at 20%. The highest predicted growth is seen in professional services, government, and healthcare.
Turning to geography, the United States leads in spending, making up almost 40% of spending this year at $2.6 billion, followed by Western Europe ($1.6 billion) and China ($777 million).
Other recent IDC blockchain forecasts and surveys include:
- IDC world blockchain spending updated for COVID-19 (June 2020)
- IDC European enterprise blockchain spending forecast (May 2020)
- IDC China enterprise blockchain spending forecast (Nov 2019)
- IDC enterprise blockchain spending forecast (Aug 2019)
- IDC: 44% of European health providers never heard of blockchain (June 2019)
- Thales, IDC research reveals extensive US government blockchain adoption (May 2019)
- IDC: Trade finance took biggest slice of 2018 APAC blockchain spending (April 2019)
- IDC forecasts rapid enterprise blockchain spending growth (March 2019)
- IDC predicts huge blockchain impact on digital transformation by 2021 (Nov 2018)
- IDC blockchain spending predictions overshadowed by startups (July 2018)
