CACTUS CACTUS J Tour Bus Manag Econ CACTUS – Journal of Tourism Business, Management and Economics 2247-3297 ASE Publishing House Bucharest, Romania 10.24818/CTS/4/2022/2.04 cactus-2022-14 Research Article L23, L26, M13, O33 Challenges and benefits of blockchain implementation in supply chain Negruțiu Cristian https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1857-8567 cristian_negrutiu@yahoo.com Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Bucharest, Romania 15 12 2022 4 2 15122022 Copyright © 2022, The Author(s) 2022 The Author(s) This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

This article presents the challenges and benefits of blockchain implementation in the supply chain. In a broader context, the article addresses how technology facilitates digitalization in a traditional industry, with no shortage of ideas and controversies. The findings are drawn from a case study of a Romanian tech startup. The empirical investigation uses interview and direct observation methods to show how the startup under study implements Industry 4.0 solutions based on blockchain technology. The findings demonstrate the feasibility of the technologies, the benefits for customers, and the challenges associated with them. So, it can be said that tech startups are real ambassadors of innovation and are able to change the status quo faster and easier. Their solutions and products have the potential to disrupt the industry and evolve into integrated platforms for artificial intelligence.

 Keywords blockchain Industry 4.0 supply chain tech start-ups

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