What is Blockchain-as-a-Service & its Business Benefits?

In this digital age, Blockchain technology has expanded beyond its most popular use from cryptocurrencies to automation of several processes with its trending Blockchain-as-a-service. BaaS is a new evolution in the Blockchain sphere that has the potential to provide solutions to business functions and thereby benefit the business. Most businesses find it difficult to leverage the true potential of Blockchain solutions and wants support to make Blockchain technology accessible to their clients. To provide the maximum benefits of blockchain development services at all levels Blockchain has enabled this cloud-based solution. It has been instrumental to design this BaaS a viable business solution to simplify all technological complex processes and reduce costs seamlessly.

With this latest evolution, numerous sectors of different niches are retrieving blockchain providers’ services and making it a core of their working model. Having the fastest growing IT technologies by their side it gets easier for the industries to design & develop Blockchain apps and deliver the maximum benefits of blockchain-based service to the target audience. Therefore, it is the forecast that sooner this blockchain-as-a-Service market will reach an exhibiting turnover and be an essential milestone for enterprises.

What Is Blockchain-as-a-Service (BaaS)?

Blockchain-as-a-service has extensive real-world uses with the help of which enterprises can leverage the true potential of Blockchain platform solutions. An important feature of BaaS is that it helps enterprises use this blockchain technology at zero per cent development cost. Not only cryptocurrency but enterprises of all industries can develop blockchain applications seamlessly and be an essential part of this trending blockchain technology era. The opportunities and integration of BaaS for businesses are numerous like identity management, immutable document tracking system, data security features, elimination of middlemen and hosting requirements. Only the limitation is that every business has to centralise the transaction through the host Blockchain’s services which most companies tend to be wary of its adoption. Because this technology is in its infancy stage, businesses need a proper solution to overcome these hurdles and get the most from this newest technology.  Blockchain-as-a-service acts as a boon to several industries that are highly dependent on data silos.

Why do Organizations Need to Adopt a BaaS Business Model?

Blockchain as a Service is currently being seen as a potentially viable solution that enables companies to gain an understanding of Blockchain technology effortlessly. Organizations and individuals who are keen to adopt blockchain technology can use BaaS to develop the skills required to operate blockchain platforms instantly. The technical issues and operational overhead costs which used to act as a constraint to implementing this system before have now been eliminated because of BaaS. It enables the adoption of this emerging blockchain system and lends partial solutions to the problems inherent in a large number of transactions. This is one of the significant reasons BaaS markets are trending among large enterprises and the blockchain-as-a-service (BaaS) market will grow in the coming years. Additionally, the investment to acquire this technology segment is also low and has little to do with blockchain’s working mechanisms. Such impact of BaaS on the business erupted in massive demand for the service and therefore start-ups to giant multinational corporations are using this BaaS for –

  • Improving Stocktaking
  • Securing Confidential Customer Records
  • Recording Property Ownership
  • Helping to launch their Initial Coin Offering

How Does Blockchain-as-a-Service Model Work?

BaaS works like a web hosting provider that manages blockchain technology for its clients. It keeps the blockchain infrastructure operational by providing a model from where third parties install and host blockchain apps. BaaS service provider sets the Blockchain infrastructure and manages client’s networks on behalf of them. The client gives fees in exchange for the service BaaS providers do to install and handle blockchain technology. It takes care of activities such as bandwidth management and hosting requirements with cloud based soutions. Using the BaaS model, customers can focus more on their blockchain’s functionality as the BaaS module manages the utility system and issues related to performance.

Blockchain-as-a-Service & its Business Benefits

Blockchain-as-as-service is emerging as an ideal solution to many challenges and relieves the burden of handling the framework of the blockchain application. You can easily make new websites, host that website on your server, and give the managing and as well as maintenance and infrastructure problems to BaaS providers. Other than this you can even outsource the bandwidth management, and data security services to them so that you can concentrate on your core business process without thinking of the complexities and difficulties of managing the Blockchain operation. Many industries are integrating BaaS solutions for supply chain management as you can rent a Blockchain infrastructure in BaaS and adapt to the growing Blockchain technology. Let’s see some more benefits of BaaS and see how it offers an easy way to adapt this Blockchain technology and stay at the edge of technology in this competitive market.

  • Documentation tracking

As the platform of blockchain is immutable one can’t make any alterations and thus offers an abiding documentation tracking system or can say a unique documentation system. Moreover, it makes sure that all users get equal access to the same information without comprising the safety and security of the documents.

  • Data storage

For decentralized applications, data storage is a necessity and as Blockchains are uniquely scalable the risk of data loss is reduced. By keeping and saving the data on a decentralized blockchain the risk of data loss is less thus using Blockchain for business a standardised organization can leverage this system and gain access to secured data.

  • Contract execution

The distributed nature of Blockchain as a Service facilitates greater transparency in any type of agreements or contracts. The contracts are processed more efficiently and denote all parties are equally informed of the proper data. Businesses can embrace Blockchain’s capabilities to its fullest as Blockchain with smart contracts can find these applications and allow to process the payments at fastest time around. Thus, the blockchain’s flexibility and related technologies helps the contracts get processed effectively. So, allow your business, whether large or small, to outsource the technologically driven work and focus on its core operational activities.

As we saw, BaaS is truly an innovative concept that helps to implement this Blockchain technology efficiently across all industry verticals. It is ideal for organisations or enterprises who outsource the technical aspects related to the integration of the Blockchain module and don’t want to get involved in the intricate Blockchain’s working mechanism. Using this third-party cloud infrastructure and management service one can take a competitive advantage and boost their respective businesses. BaaS operates as a web host which runs an app’s backend and also saves costs while increasing efficiency and enhancing the operation processes. So, don’t waste time and introduce this concept in your business processes and improve your enterprise operations while simplifying complex processes.

Heritage Financial (NASDAQ:HFWA) Given New $34.00 Price Target at Piper Sandler

Heritage Financial (NASDAQ:HFWA – Get Rating) had its price objective boosted by Piper Sandler to $34.00 in a report issued on Friday morning, Stock Target Advisor reports.

Separately, DA Davidson upgraded Heritage Financial from a neutral rating to a buy rating in a research note on Monday, July 25th.

Heritage Financial Stock Performance

Heritage Financial stock opened at $26.71 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $937.63 million, a PE ratio of 12.09 and a beta of 0.53. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $26.58 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $25.65. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a current ratio of 0.75 and a quick ratio of 0.75. Heritage Financial has a 12 month low of $20.95 and a 12 month high of $28.41.

Heritage Financial (NASDAQ:HFWA – Get Rating) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 21st. The financial services provider reported $0.52 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.45 by $0.07. The firm had revenue of $57.06 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $56.23 million. Heritage Financial had a net margin of 33.11% and a return on equity of 9.41%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.90 earnings per share. Research analysts expect that Heritage Financial will post 2.13 earnings per share for the current year.

Heritage Financial Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, August 17th. Investors of record on Wednesday, August 3rd were paid a dividend of $0.21 per share. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.14%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, August 2nd. Heritage Financial’s dividend payout ratio is currently 38.01%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Heritage Financial

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. ExodusPoint Capital Management LP increased its stake in Heritage Financial by 1.6% in the 2nd quarter. ExodusPoint Capital Management LP now owns 29,042 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $731,000 after purchasing an additional 457 shares in the last quarter. rhino investment partners Inc grew its stake in Heritage Financial by 49.4% during the 2nd quarter. rhino investment partners Inc now owns 217,387 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $5,469,000 after acquiring an additional 71,866 shares in the last quarter. Jane Street Group LLC purchased a new position in Heritage Financial during the 2nd quarter valued at about $306,000. Prudential Financial Inc. grew its stake in Heritage Financial by 5.0% during the 2nd quarter. Prudential Financial Inc. now owns 38,440 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $967,000 after acquiring an additional 1,840 shares in the last quarter. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC grew its stake in Heritage Financial by 10.0% during the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 73,604 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,852,000 after acquiring an additional 6,685 shares in the last quarter. 78.62% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.