Will Samsung’s Crypto Drive Topple Google & Co’s Internet Empire?

Just how significant could Samsung’s foray into the world of blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies prove to be? Per some thinkers in South Korea, the smartphone maker’s decision to include a crypto wallet on its latest flagship devices could help it – and other companies – end Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple’s dominance of the internet.

South Korean cryptocurrency trader and business-owner William Cho tells Cryptonews.com, “Samsung has broken the seal by including a crypto wallet on its new phones. It has literally opened the floodgates for hardware-makers to create new outposts of the internet without any need for gate-keeping mega-companies that are still dilly-dallying about their own blockchain business plans.”

Meanwhile, Fn Today columnist Quinby notes that smartphone-based blockchain technology could allow for all sorts of changes to the status quo. Quinby writes, “As blockchain technology becomes more common, decentralization will cause Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple to lose strength, while Samsung’s presence will grow even larger. Individual smartphones could become nodes on a blockchain [platform] or help owners make money by mining cryptocurrencies […] without compromising users’ privacy.”

For example, as reported, by deploying XPhones and its blockchain-enabled Point-of-Sales devices (XPOS), Pundi X aims to reach new crypto users and add tens of thousands of new nodes to its new blockchain ecosystem, Function X.

The same writer also opines, “Samsung can become the most powerful company in the blockchain era even if it only pursues the technology through its smartphone business. Blockchain is a game changer that will rewrite the existing rules of the Internet. If Samsung makes good use of the blockchain, it can become the newest Internet powerhouse.”

There are signs that suggest that even some of South Korea’s largest internet companies realize that large-scale blockchain investment represents a smart long-term roadmap for growth, as business models created before the rise of Industry 4.0 already begin to look obsolete.

Cho states, “You need only take a look at what companies like Kakao or Naver are doing to see that they understand that blockchain and cryptocurrencies are no fad.”

Indeed, there are signs that the Kakao-Naver “blockchain war” experts forecast only last year has already broken out.

Naver, which owns the Line messaging app, has already outlined extensive blockchain platform development and cryptocurrency plans.

The Kakao Group, the owner of a number of blockchain-related subsidies (including Upbit, one of South Korea’s largest crypto exchanges), just recently made an undisclosed investment in blockchain startup Terra, who will use the funds to promote the adoption of the latter’s public blockchain payment solution. Other major South Korean Terra backers include e-commerce giant TMON.

While hardware makers like Samsung lead a blockchain-crypto assault on one front, internet companies – such as Kakao and Naver – that operate messaging apps present a totally different challenge to any IT giant not currently involved in blockchain-related business.

Readers will also recall that Telegram’s new Gram token and blockchain platform will likely be unveiled this month. And some say it may not be too late for Facebook after all, as the company appears to be working fervently on wide-scale blockchain developments behind closed doors.

New York Times writers Nathaniel Popper and Mike Isaac opine, “Messaging companies have a reach that dwarfs the backers of earlier cryptocurrencies. Facebook and Telegram can make the digital wallets used for cryptocurrencies available, in an instant, to hundreds of millions of users.”