Rapidly launching enterprise blockchain platforms for “internet of things” networks just got easier with the release of Filament’s Blocklet Kit distributed ledger technology starter kit.

Announced Tuesday, the Blocklet Kit is an end-to-end solution starter kit designed to provide corporations everything needed to build a proof-of-concept blockchain network easily. The kit includes hardware, software and security protocol plus training and support for maintaining a network built on distributed ledger blockchain technology.

“2018 has been a breakout year for enterprise blockchain technology,” said Allison Clift-Jennings, chief executive of Filament. “However, education and support remain critical as many companies are in the early stages of evaluation, exploration and deployment.”

Filament’s history in the blockchain industry includes considerable experience building hardware solutions that connect blockchain networks to physical assets such as machinery and sensors. The company does this by hosting its own blockchain connector system and the development of hardware with secure enclaves designed to generate cryptographic identities, authentication for individual devices and trustworthy signatory for transactions.

With Filament’s blockchain product, a workshop or warehouse can quickly build and secure a network of devices across an entire factory or campus. Each time a new device wants to provision itself onto the network, the secure enclave in the blockchain connector already has pregenerated cryptographic keys, which identify and authenticate the device and its activity.

Blockchains also provide a tamper-resistant infrastructure for historical records of transactions. As a result, both new and old devices on the network produce an auditable communication history. That makes Filament’s product useful for enterprise solutions because operators can be fairly sure that the record of machine or sensor communication belongs to that sensor and was reliably recorded.

The Blocklet blockchain starter kit is already in use by global corporations across multiple industries, including automotive, communications and other sectors. As of today, the Blocklet Kit is generally available to the public and is ready for deployment even for mission-critical systems.

“Our blockchain starter kit, which includes both the essential technology components and the on-site training, makes it as easy as possible for customers to get started with proofs of concept and production use cases,” said Clift-Jennings.

The current hardware, Filament’s Blocklet USB Enclave, is an industry first, designed to enable existing industrial and enterprise machines to securely execute transactions on a blockchain. All it needs is a USB-compatible port and any machine can be turned into a Blocklet machine.

For embedded solutions, the next-gen Blocklet Chip is coming soon. It delivers a low-cost IoT-enabled trusted enclave with a very small footprint and low power.

The Blocklet Kit includes a solutions suite that packages custom hardware, pre-loaded with all the relevant software, links and documentation in a deployment-ready platform. The starter kit will provide blockchain-native devices built into a universal serial device, or USB, and universal asynchronous receiver-transmitter, or UART-compatible secure storage, that are provisioned to link into a Filament-hosted blockchain network.

Filament’s Blocklet technology also supports multiple blockchain platforms and can connect with BigchainDB and Ethereum as well as IBM Corp.’s Hyperledger Fabric and Hyperledger Sawtooth frameworks.

For developers and businesses alike, Filament maintains a robust software development kit and provides example code to make experimental integrations easy and efficient. During and after implementation, customers of the Blocklet Kit also get access to Filament’s onsite training and technical support at every stage.

Image: Filament