A study of the impact of implementation of smart contracts in the sharing economy

Abstract

The sharing economy has shown significant growth in recent years, reinforced by the emergence and success of companies like Uber, Airbnb, eBay, etc. Consistently, it is attracting more and more attention from both the business and academic communities, which in turn are driving the development and adoption of new technologies in the sharing economy, such as smart contracts. However, which attributes of sharing economy business model would be most effectively modified by smart contracts and what would the qualitative effect? To answer these questions in this paper, we conducted a four-part study. First, we presented a description of the sharing economy and smart contract technology. Second, we considered the previously proposed generalized business model of a sharing economy company. Third, we identified the attributes of this business model to which smart contracts can be most effectively applied. Fourth, we qualitatively presented the effect of using smart contracts for each attribute.