Wholechain Selects Algorand as New Blockchain Provider to Improve Supply Chain Visibility

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Sep 08, 2022, 09:01 ET

Having a blockchain with zero downtime, forking, and carbon footprint will improve Wholechain's capacity to serve governments, nonprofits, and some of the world's largest brands

SINGAPORE and BLOOMFIELD HILLS, Mich., Sept. 8, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Wholechain, the blockchain-based traceability solution built to enable trust, coordination, and transparency in fragmented supply chains, today announced a partnership with the Algorand Foundation, whose mission is to grow the ecosystem of Algorand, the carbon-negative Layer 1 blockchain invented by Turing Award winner and MIT professor Silvio Micali.

Currently, many supply chain operations remain opaque across industry verticals. MIT Sloan has found that 81 percent of companies do not have full visibility into their supply chains, and 54 percent have no visibility at all. Consumers, retailers, and auditors are unable to easily verify claims about sustainable, ethical, and responsible sourcing. This hurts sellers; 94 percent of consumers are more likely to be loyal to a brand that offers complete supply chain transparency. For distributors, supply chain management remains arduous and costly. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reports that supply chains cause 40 percent of food waste in North America.

Wholechain and Algorand are stepping into the gap with blockchain-enabled traceability without the carbon footprint historically associated with blockchain. The solution enables businesses to trace products to their origins, have visibility into every step along the way, and verify claims made about those products. In this partnership, Algorand will be the default blockchain for Wholechain's updated offering (Version 4), which features an improved user experience.

"It is extremely important to Wholechain and our customers that we partner with a blockchain that is scalable, reliable, and secure, with a minimal carbon footprint," said Jayson Berryhill, Co-Founder of Wholechain. "The choice of Algorand as our go-forward partner for our newest release was a no-brainer. Beyond its clear technical advantages, the fact that Algorand is mission-aligned with regard to environmental responsibility made the choice clear. We are grateful to the Algorand Foundation for their partnership and collaboration, and we are excited for the roadmap of innovations we will deliver for global supply chains."

"We're passionate about Wholechain's mission because, as the pandemic clearly demonstrated, the world desperately needs well-functioning and efficient supply chains," said Matt Keller, Director of Impact and Inclusion at the Algorand Foundation. "We look forward to the day when everyone, including major humanitarian organizations, large consumer brands, and small-holder farmers, can trace agricultural products up and down the supply chain, building trust in the market and empowering both consumers and growers."

Wholechain's team will transition existing customers to the new version starting in early September. Wholechain meets GS1 data standards such as EPCIS and industry standards like the Global Dialogue on Seafood Traceability, which enables end-to-end data sharing across supply chains. Robust APIs have also been added for integrations within customers' enterprises.

ALGORAND FOUNDATION
The Algorand blockchain — designed by MIT professor and Turing Award winning cryptographer Silvio Micali — is uniquely capable of delivering on the promise of a borderless global economy. It achieves transaction throughputs at the speed of traditional finance, but with immediate finality, near zero transaction costs, and on a 24/7 basis. Its carbon-neutral platform and unique pure proof-of-stake consensus mechanism solves for the "blockchain trilemma" by achieving both security and scalability on a decentralized protocol, and without a second of downtime since it went live in 2019.

The Algorand Foundation is dedicated to helping fulfill the global promise of the Algorand blockchain by taking responsibility for its sound monetary supply economics, decentralized governance, and healthy and prosperous open-source ecosystem. For more information, visit https://algorand.foundation

WHOLECHAIN
Wholechain is a blockchain-based traceability solution built to enable trust, coordination, and transparency in fragmented supply chains. Wholechain works across commodities, allowing businesses to manage risks and increase efficiencies while enabling consumers to make more responsible decisions. Wholechain is part of numerous industry initiatives for interoperability including GS1's Seafood Industry Blockchain Interoperability POC, and is a former winner of the Fish 2.0 Competition at Stanford for Supply Chain Innovation, and a winner of the FDA's New Era of Smarter Food Safety Food Traceability Challenge. Find out more at Wholechain.com.