An application of blockchain smart contracts and IoT in logistics

Abstract

Over the last few years, interest has emerged in blockchain, a decentralized ledger technology (DLT) created for use in cryptocurrencies, but with a great potential to be used in other application domains. One of them is supply chain management, tracking and tracing, which are key processes to the logistics industry, made difficult due to the lack of standards or trust between actors, miscommunication, fraud and bureaucratic delays, among other issues. In order to overcome some of these challenges, the solution presented in this dissertation proposes a blockchain system application created with Ethereum smart contracts technology. Its main purpose is to be used in supply chain and logistics for the tracking and tracing products, where the storage of important data is done and verified in a trustworthy, decentralized system. The technical solution presented here implements methods for tracking, certification, quality control and authentication, and integrates the communication of blockchain with IoT devices, which play an important role in monitoring products and automating these processes. This approach is validated by the development of a smart contract system and two browser-based applications to interact with it. The first application allows users to access and view their product’s tracking data, while the second bridges the communication between an Arduino UNO microcontroller collecting temperature readings and our smart contract system. The work presented here highlights the benefits of these technologies applied to logistics and validates the feasibility of this approach, ultimately giving insight into the capabilities, qualities, but also of the limitations a system like this can have.