Blockchain for UAE Organizations: Insights from CIOs with Opportunities and Challenges

A blockchain is a distributed ledger and the underlying technology of the Bitcoin cryptocurrency, allowing it to operate in a decentralized fashion with no intermediaries such as financial institutions. The use of blockchain, however, will be far beyond the financial sector; smart contracts, for example would allow business and legal agreements to be stored and executed online. It is anticipated that blockchain will do to middle- and back-office functions what the Internet and the Web have done to the front-office - automate functions. In this paper, we investigate what Chief Information Officers (CIOs) think of blockchain and how they plan to utilize it for their organizations. We conducted a survey that was completed by 25 CIOs in the United Arab Emirates and found mixed feelings about the technology and barriers for use. In this paper, we also discuss opportunities and challenges in adopting blockchain.