- Startup safeguards privacy and security of digital documents and provides an immutable chain of custody for transactions.
- Finds a way to manage blockchain more securely and cost-effectively than any other solution provider.
There are many big and small players in the digital signature space globally but one startup which is making its mark felt is – ZorroSign.
Headquartered in Dubai and with bases in many countries, ZorroSign has already signed big contracts with the governments and organisations in the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) countries.
There are huge players in the digital signature space, Shamsh Hadi, CEO of ZorroSign, said in an exclusive interview with Tech Channel News but none of them has figured out how to cost-effectively map their legacy software in technologies and evolve it into Web 3.0 and blockchain solutions today.
“In an interview, Daniel Springer, CEO of DocuSign, in December of 2020, admitted that blockchain is just too expensive for them to incorporate or adopt.
“So, we have solved all these problems such as bringing blockchain to digital signatures, entirely on blockchain from the ground up. Not like other competitors, big and small, who tried to add blockchain onto their legacy software.”
Blockchain is not a piece of cloth where you can put it on when it is raining or boots when it is cold, he said, but it needs to be addressed properly from the ground up.
Standing out from the crowd
“We have pioneered a way to manage blockchain more securely and more cost-effectively than any other solution providers out there today. We can scale our architecture to meet our customers’ needs, in a way that big providers will not be able to solve due to the cost factor,” Hadi said.
Blockchain came to the world with a big splash and started off with cryptocurrency and the hot topic now is NFTs (non-fungible tokens).
“In my opinion, blockchain does not have regulations and regulations come into place depending on the use cases. In terms of data and transacting data, there are data sovereignty rules in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and globally,” Hadi said.
When it comes to cryptocurrency, he said that a lot of governments have already rolled out or are rolling out initial draft laws.
“The UAE already has a basic law in place and will evolve over time. So, you will not see regulation for blockchain in common but for the different uses where blockchain technology has been monetised.”
The UAE has launched several programmes that include a blockchain platform for government entities and a legislative sandbox for fintech startups.
GCC: A unique place
“GCC is a very unique place and forward-thinking region. This part of the world knows that the future is based on technology and is willing to spend their money to develop their platforms and continue to re-develop their platforms over and over again to be competitive. They have the information at their fingertips and that is why they can make these decisions,” Hadi said.
The UAE Government adopted blockchain technology in conducting its transactions in 2018 and launched the Emirates Blockchain Strategy 2021 and Dubai Blockchain Strategy in 2016.
In the 1990s, Hadi’s co-founder introduced an innovative new technology for electronic signatures, in government agencies and companies, mostly in the US, such as UPS, American Express, etc.
Former US President Bill Clinton signed an e-act in 2000 using this technology.
“The platform was invented to move documentation, digital transactions from a relationship built on trust to a relationship built on truth, providing customers the ability to positively impact the environment to sustainable practices and securely transform their paper-based workloads to digital in a bid to remove errors and increase productivity,” Hadi said.
Advancing sustainability
ZorroSign is very much out there to set a trend to advance sustainability while advancing technology, he said and added that they are a multi-chain blockchain platform that not only integrates digital signatures but also integrates AI and machine learning from completion, identity as a service, patented fraud prevention to ensure user authentication and document verification that adheres to global privacy and security standards.
Every industry can benefit from digital signatures, but he said that ZorroSign focused initially on financial services, legal services and IT space, which are the early adopters of this technology.
Being an advisor to the US Government and regularly getting called upon to the House and the Senate, Hadi said that a lot of feedback they give to them is to address or patch on solutions to a very legacy and old technology. “They have technologies running from the 1970s and 1980s, still at the Federal level. They have not quickly evolved and that is why the GCC countries are going to be far ahead in the game in the future,” he said.
Moreover, he said that Saudi Arabia is catching up fast but the other smaller countries in the Gulf are slowly waking up. The two countries that are pushing forward are the UAE and Saudi Arabia.
The blockchain platform ZorroSign was founded in Dubai, UAE, in 2015.
Playing a key role
“Governments in the GCC are playing a key role while the UAE and Saudi Arabia have passed the laws for electronic transactions and commerce, including e-signatures, was there from 2006,” Hadi said.
In terms of blockchain, he said that they already have governments in the UAE, who are their customers, who are looking specifically for blockchain solutions.
“We are also catering to one government entity in Oman and Saudi Arabia,” he said.
When asked about breaches taking place on the blockchain platform, he said: “I don’t think any company can claim that their technology is hackproof. There are ways to protect ourselves and blockchain technology surely does that because it uses multiple nodes and the infrastructure and architecture help us do that.”
When platforms roll out solutions based on blockchain, he said that they may use different architectures but the blockchain is not a policeman that protects them.
“If a solution has holes and if a breach happens, blockchain is not the one to be blamed. Blockchain has a ledger to show the actual proof but it depends on the type and the ways they have used the methodology of blockchain. If they have used a private and permission-based, you will not have access to it.”
Ultimately, he said that it is the platform that everything was built on, from trust-based to the truth based, and it is now on how, we as organisations, experts and individuals, roll it out and have proper use cases for it.
Great for zero-trust environment
“Blockchain came into the world with cryptocurrency with very little education and still the general public does not have enough education on why blockchain is important. Data is where, even the quantum computers, have not been able to be manipulated,” Hadi said.
Covid, he said has boosted the adoption of blockchain technology and virtual networks as they are great for zero-trust environments.
The US is the biggest market for the startup but India is catching up to the US market but Hadi wants the Middle East to be the biggest in the near future.
The Middle East contributes 15 per cent to the user base.
Hadi said that ZorroSign, still bootstrapped, is looking to raise about $20 million in Series A funding later this year or early next year to venture into newer sectors and expand its platform and reach.
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