On November 5th, 2020, in the margins of the largest entrepreneurship festival in Latin America: INCmty, held virtually for the first time ever, the German – Mexican Energy Partnership (EP) participated in two separate events.
On the one hand, the EP presented the specialized study "Blockchain in the Mexican Energy Sector", designed to provide a broad outlook of this technology and its uses in the energy sector. The EP in close collaboration with KPMG Mexico, developed the study where more than 100 experts from the private sector, the public sector, the academic sector, foundations, startups and associations took part.
The study was divided into concise chapters where the reader can learn what Blockchain is; the main stakeholders in the Mexican energy sector and the ecosystem; the current industry challenges and obstacles; complementary technologies; business models based on Blockchain and the existing applications for the energy sector; the successful cases that can be applied in the Mexican market; the impacts of this technology and the risks to be considered when defining a Blockchain strategy.
When presenting the study, the EP emphasized on the importance of using this technology as a mean, not an end by itself, since it is not the answer to every problem the energy sector faces. However, it can provide many innovative tools to facilitate and have confidence in different processes.
On the other hand, within the context of the Collaboration Agreement between Siemens Energy Mexico GIZ Mexico, through the German – Mexican Energy Partnership, both organizations announced and awarded the winners of the first edition of the "Blockchain in Energy Transformation Challenge". The challenge asked for innovative proposals, based on the Blockchain technology, to transform the energy sector in Mexico.
In the award ceremony, both organizations highlighted the importance of supporting local innovation initiatives facing challenges such as climate change and that are seeking to implement technological and economically viable solutions for the success of the energy transition. For the challenge, 12 proposals from Mexico, Chile, Spain, the United States and Germany were carefully evaluated. The projects and proposals were analyzed by a committee integrated by academic and technical profiles specialized in finance, energy, digitization and Blockchain. The team´s ratings were based on three categories: business potential, use case feasibility, and technology robustness.
The first place was obtained by Phineal (Chile) a startup with its proposal "Blockchain Energy App"; the second place went to the Energy Web Foundation (U.S.A. and Germany) with their proposal "InCEL"; and tied in third place, the proposal “Genergy” (Mexico) and the startup E.Proof (Chile and Mexico).
To conclude the event, representatives from GIZ Mexico and Siemens Energy Mexico underlined the importance of collaboration and synergies to continue working towards the global energy transition.
#Blockchain #Technology #DigitalTransformation
Contact: Francisco Contreras (francisco.contreras(at)giz.de)
