Brits To Sell 10,000 Tickets for the 2018 World Cup on Blockchain

A couple of recent graduates from Imperial College London, in the United Kingdom, say they have teamed up with official ticket vendors to sell 10,000 tickets for the 2018 World Cup, to be held in Russia next month. They also say they are in talks with football clubs in Britain, and could potentially sell season tickets for the 2019-2020 season via their blockchain-powered platform.

The duo, Annika Monari and Alan Vey, state, per newspapers The Times and the Guardian, that their system (The Aventus Protocol) could put an end to ticket touts, fake tickets and inordinately high resale prices.

The graduates’ system, they claim, uses cryptocurrency and blockchain technology, and will allow event organizers to issue non-transferable tickets. They have dubbed their platform the “bitcoin of ticketing.”

The duo says their solution allows organizers to track the status and ownership of the tickets they issue. The solution, they say, can also let organizers keep an eye on prices, should tickets be resold. Monari and Vey say blockchain technology prevents forgery, as the digital, shared ledger the solution operates on is tamper-proof.

According to the roadmap, published on a website of Aventus, their Beta version of the minimum viable product (MVP) had to be released in the first quarter of this year, while the startup released its source code in April.