The book offers an introduction to the technical foundation of decentralized insurance models, for advanced undergraduate students, graduate students and practitioners. The book is self-contained and anyone with a basic knowledge of probability and statistics should be able to follow through the entire book. It adopts a minimalist approach to describe the essential elements and first principles so that readers can get a gist of these models without being overwhelmed with too much technicality. It can be used as a reference for business model designs. The inclusion of exercises and practical examples makes the book suitable for advanced courses on decentralized insurance and risk sharing. There is a mix of industry practices and academic models presented in this book. The exposition starts with an overview of historic and current business practices and preliminaries on the mathematics and economics of risk and insurance. A bird's-eye view of traditional insurance is provided as a benchmark for various topics to be used in contrast with decentralized insurance. The book then continues with decentralized insurance practices around the world, including online mutual aid originated in China, takaful from the Islamic world, peer-to-peer insurance in the West, catastrophe risk pooling for Carribean countries, etc. Theories of aggregate risk pooling and peer-to-peer risk exchanges are provided for readers to appreciate the mathematical foundation of risk sharing. A unified framework of decentralized insurance is presented to show a structured approach to the economic design of decentralized business models. The book ends with a technical review of blockchain and decentralized finance (DeFi) insurance applications.

In the sector of modern finance, a new issue emerges – the fragility of traditional financial systems in the face of technological evolution. The march of time has brought forth formidable challenges, shaking the foundations of age-old norms. This evolving financial paradigm grapples with challenges such as trust issues, geographical limitations, and exclusivity. In response to these challenges, Decentralized Finance and Tokenization in FinTech offers profound insights and solutions to navigate the complexities of this era. This book delves into the disruptive forces of Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and the revolutionary nature of Tokenization, ultimately paving the way toward a decentralized future. This comprehensive resource seeks to contribute significantly to current research and understanding in the realms of DeFi and Tokenization. It serves as an educational cornerstone, providing in-depth insights into fundamental concepts, technologies, and applications for both newcomers and seasoned professionals. By demystifying technical complexities, addressing challenges, and analyzing comparative advantages, the book empowers readers to navigate the evolving landscape. From decentralized governance models to global perspectives on DeFi, it fosters thought leadership and inspires discussions on the societal, economic, and technological impacts of decentralized finance and tokenization.

This book sets out to explain blockchain for the non-technical expert, to decipher the dense technicalities that dominate the field and to present the opportunities for busy professionals using practical applications and case studies. Presented in a clear and structured way and with documented real-world cases, the book is a practical reference guide that can be used across different industries. It offers both a constructive and critical review of the pain points blockchain is facing today, illustrates the pitfalls as well as the opportunities for business and describes the steps towards overcoming them. It also aims to provide a unique view of both the intersection and synergy of blockchain with other emerging technologies and the wider digital ecosystem, as we see increasingly that blockchain alone won’t be able to deliver business solutions. Most important, the book identifies trends and a path for the future of blockchain and its impact on society as a whole. The book is written for business audiences across all sectors. It is not a technical guide to blockchain, but it enables businesspeople to be better informed and prepared to plan ahead and develop strategies using blockchain.

The surge in technological transformation affects all business model phases over many industries. Emerging technologies provide new avenues for industries to increase their competitive advantage and enhance economic progression. Blockchain technology’s ability to build an open and trustworthy network model seems to promote shared IT-based networks in banking, insurance, and other similar industries. The adoption of blockchain in the banking and insurance industry is developing rapidly. Applications, Challenges, and Opportunities of Blockchain Technology in Banking and Insurance explores how blockchain technologies optimize and integrate the transactions and operations in association with access to information and reduction in communication costs and negligible data transfer errors. It includes studies on various banking and insurance industries intending to use blockchain technology to make transactions convenient, simple, and safe. Covering topics such as cryptocurrency, digital transformation, and small and medium-sized enterprises, this premier reference source is an essential resource for policymakers, government officials, students and educators of higher education, libraries, banking managers, insurance professionals, researchers, and academicians.

I.AM catalyzes the “convergence for good” of the biological, physical and digital worlds, helping us to better tackle the toughest challenges of the 2020s: climate change, resource depletion, an aging population, social inclusion, the empowerment of people, health crises and the post-pandemic world, as well as new issues emerging in relation to economical, societal and everyday life. This book dives into disruptive concepts of I.AM such as: Trust as a Service, Business as a Game, ATAWAD (AnyTime, AnyWhere, Any Device), PCE (Productivity of Collaborative Exchange), Unimedia, Shazamization of everything, decentralization of everything, BOTization and Build to Order for Me, Blockchain and Empowerment of Me, edge computing, augmented industry, augmentation value chain and empowering innovation, etc. The fluid, easy-to-read style of this book targets the broadest scope of readers, from purpose-driven and business-oriented individuals, to students, researchers, experts, innovators, consultants, managers and politicians, all eager to empower people to work towards a more sustainable future.

This book features the second volume of the proceedings of the 9th International Conference of the International Association of Cultural and Digital Tourism (IACuDiT). Held at the Syros Island in Greece in September 2022, the conference's lead theme was ‘Tourism, Travel, and Hospitality in a Smart and Sustainable World’. With a full appreciation of the contributions made by numerous writers toward the progress in tourism research, this book presents a critical academic discourse on sustainable practices in a smart tourism context, stimulating future debates and advancing knowledge and understanding in this critical area of knowledge. It also puts emphasis on the knowledge economy and smart destinations notion. It enacts new modes of tourism management and development and presents chapters on emerging technologies, such as location-based services, Internet of Things, smart cities, mobile services, gamification, digital collections and the virtual visitor, social media, social networking, and augmented reality

The disruptive potential of technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), blockchain, the Internet of Things (IoT), and biotechnology catalysts redefine traditional business models and serve as instrumental forces in attracting venture capital investments. The lower barriers to entry, facilitated by these disruptive technologies, empower entrepreneurs to bring their ideas to market, creating a more accessible landscape for funding and innovation. Fostering Innovation in Venture Capital and Startup Ecosystems explores this transformative intersection, where emerging technologies catalyze change, fuel innovation, and redefine the dynamics of financial investments and entrepreneurial endeavors. Moreover, the book delves into how embracing AI, IoT, blockchain, and augmented reality/virtual reality can expedite innovation, enhance efficiency, and scale businesses. Through a multidisciplinary lens, readers understand how these technologies influence established markets, drive economic growth, and create job opportunities. This book is ideal for venture capitalists, angel investors, entrepreneurs, startup founders, and policymakers.

Competition, the drive for efficiency, and continuous improvement ultimately push businesses toward automation and later towards autonomy. If a business can operate without human intervention, it will minimize its operational cost. If Uber can remove the expense of a driver with an autonomous vehicle, it will provide its service cheaper than a competitor who can’t. If an artificially intelligent trading company can search, find, and take advantage of some arbitrage opportunity, then it can profit where its competitors cannot. A business that can analyze and execute in real-time without needing to wait for a human to act, is a business that will be able to take advantage of brief inefficiencies from other markets or businesses. This trend following a thesis that is based on 100 years of proven economic theory. Short-wave economic cycles, those 5- to 10-year cycles, are driven by credit but the long-wave economic cycles, those 50- to 60-year cycles, are driven by technological revolution. We’ve had 5 cycles over the past 200 years with the last wave, the Age of Information & Telecommunications. We've seen evidence that a new cycle has begun. Technological revolutions come by way of a cluster of new innovations. About a decade ago, you started to see AI, robotics and IoT (sensors) delivering on automation. That’s been powerful, but not transformational. It does not force businesses to fundamentally change how they do business. The last piece of the puzzle was cryptocurrency because it allows us to process and transfer economic value without human intervention. Soon, there will be a global race to build autonomous operations. Businesses and organizations without autonomous operations simply will not be able to compete with those that do because ... autonomy is the ultimate competitive advantage. Crypto is the mechanism that will accrue value from being the infrastructure for the next digital financial revolution. Crypto Asset Investing lays out a case that we’ve begun a new technological revolution similar to the Internet Age of the 1990’s. Artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things, robotics and cryptocurrency are converging to deliver on a new age, what I call the Age of Autonomy. Understanding the transformation that’s taken place before anyone else can yield enormous investment opportunity. In this book, you’ll learn how and why to invest in crypto assets.