{"id":12493,"date":"2022-08-16T16:29:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-16T16:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hederav2stg.wpenginepowered.com\/learning\/smart-contract-applications\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T18:10:52","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T18:10:52","slug":"smart-contract-applications","status":"publish","type":"learning","link":"https:\/\/hedera.com\/learning\/smart-contract-applications\/","title":{"rendered":"Smart contract applications"},"content":{"rendered":"

Smart contracts are an essential element of blockchain technology. They allow developers to create on-chain applications to be executed when specific parameters are met. Many people associate smart contracts with only transactions and NFTs. However, the benefits of smart contracts <\/strong>are vast, and smart contract use cases are growing in a variety of industries.<\/p>\n

Smart contract markets were valued at $149.5 million in 2021; by 2030, they are projected to reach $820.62 million (*1).\u00a0Needless to say, to avoid getting left in the past, it’s worth understanding how your industry<\/strong> could use smart contracts.<\/p>\n

Which industries use smart contracts?<\/h3>\n

The self-executing code used in smart contract technology<\/strong> is well-suited to handling nearly any “if\/then” statement. Smart contracts can read specific input parameters and execute a corresponding output. This gives smart contract applications a wide range of use cases that eliminate the need for third-party intermediaries.<\/p>\n

Countless companies are testing smart contracts <\/strong>within their industries to manage data and payments securely. Here’s a look at real-world value that smart contracts provide.<\/p>\n

Real estate<\/h3>\n

Blockchain allows developers to tokenize real-world assets such as real estate. Once tokenized, smart contracts facilitate property transfers<\/strong> between buyers and sellers easily. Properties are often seen as illiquid assets since they take a long time to sell. Smart contracts offer sellers an easy way to fractionalize their properties and sell fractionalized ownership rights to buyers.<\/p>\n

Finance<\/h3>\n

Traditional financial services require third-party intermediaries, which can lead to high fees, long transaction times, and the inherent need to trust the individuals with whom you transact. Numerous decentralized finance apps<\/a> have improved on conventional trade finance, giving users a new way to lend, borrow, and trade<\/strong> in a secure environment without human intervention. These decentralized applications often rely on smart contracts to match borrowers with lenders or manage liquidity pools that let traders buy and sell assets seamlessly.<\/p>\n

Still, decentralized finance <\/strong>has one major drawback that certain projects aim to solve using smart contracts. As the number of digital assets and blockchains continues to grow, so does the need for interoperability. Projects like Hashport<\/a> aim to solve the interoperability issue by facilitating money transfer between networks. Hashport uses Hedera Consensus Service<\/a> to track and record the activity of digital assets between networks.<\/p>\n

Construction<\/h3>\n

Construction isn’t likely the first thing that comes to mind when thinking of the different industries where smart contracts use software code to make things happen outside of blockchains. But the construction industry is using smart contracts in many ways to automate tasks and improve efficiency. For example, blockchain oracles can feed real-time data regarding a construction company’s supply chain to a smart contract that automatically orders new supplies<\/strong> when certain thresholds are met. Additionally, smart contracts can trigger automatic payments for contractors on specific dates or when defined criteria are met.<\/p>\n

Healthcare<\/h3>\n

If a patient’s medical records were stored on a secure blockchain<\/strong>, the approval process for procedures could be automatically executed. For example, suppose a medical professional wanted to know whether a patient’s insurance provider would cover a procedure. In that case, they could input the insurance provider’s name, and a smart contract could compare the patient’s healthcare data against the provider’s criteria for approval.<\/p>\n

Another important way smart contracts can enhance the healthcare industry is by allowing healthcare providers to securely store trial data and patient medical records<\/strong>. Companies like Safe Health Systems Inc.<\/a> already use the Hedera ledger to log patient information. Hedera’s hashgraph consensus mechanism can enable developers to build smart contracts that analyze massive amounts of healthcare data within seconds.<\/p>\n

NFT<\/h3>\n

NFTs have seen a huge boom in popularity over the last five years. These non-fungible assets<\/a> couldn’t exist without smart contracts. Smart contracts are used to mint NFTs and assign ownership<\/strong> of the tokens. Additionally, smart contracts can add functionality to a particular NFT. For example, if someone designs a character that changes form after pre-defined conditions, smart contracts could trigger its “evolution.”<\/p>\n

Smart contracts can use blockchain oracles<\/strong> to change an NFT’s appearance. For example, you can create an NFT with an outdoor background that features weather conditions that change according to the real-world weather conditions in the NFT owner’s region.<\/p>\n

Royalties are another important NFT feature offered by smart contract technology. NFT creators can set specific asset royalties<\/strong> when minting a new token. These royalties are paid out on all secondary sales. However, to trigger a royalty payment, NFTs often must be sold using the same marketplaces they were bought on. Projects like HashAxis<\/a> use native royalties on Hedera to avoid developing complex smart contracts.<\/p>\n

Supply chain<\/h3>\n

Smart contracts can be used to enhance a company’s supply chain. For example, they can trigger payment automatically when an entity needs to be paid for supplies, shipment, or product management. Additionally, smart contracts can automatically record payments<\/strong>, state changes, and other supply-chain data. This data can be viewed by all links in the supply chain as needed.<\/p>\n

Smart contracts can automate many aspects of a supply chain, but the occasional need for human intervention can arise. Smart contracts can alert the appropriate party or multiple parties using IoT devices<\/strong> and a blockchain oracle. For example, suppose an IoT device notices abnormal humidity or temperatures in a warehouse. In that case, it can feed data to a smart contract that triggers a notification to the warehouse manager.<\/p>\n

A company called ServiceNow uses the Hedera network<\/a> to enhance multi-party workflows<\/strong>, such as supply chains. ServiceNow increases the quality and safety of interactions between all supply-chain participants.<\/p>\n

Grow with Hedera smart contract applications<\/h3>\n

Hedera offers countless ways for organizations to use smart contracts in their workflow. The Hedera network can automate features<\/strong> you would otherwise need to hire developers to achieve, such as tokenization. Hedera’s hashgraph consensus mechanism<\/a> enables lightning-fast transactions and predictable fees, making it easy to plan ahead when incorporating smart contracts into your business.<\/p>\n

There are numerous real-world examples <\/strong>of companies that have already begun building a digital identity on the Hedera<\/a> network, and we expect many more will use our technology in the coming years.<\/p>\n

1 Smart Contracts Market Size And Forecast<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Smart contracts are an essential element of blockchain technology. They allow developers to create on-chain applications to be executed when specific parameters are met. Many people associate smart contracts with only transactions and NFTs. However, the benefits of smart contracts are vast, and smart contract use cases are growing in a variety of industries. Smart […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"tags":[38],"class_list":["post-12493","learning","type-learning","status-publish","hentry","tag-smart-contracts"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nSmart contract applications | Hedera<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/hedera.com\/learning\/smart-contract-applications\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Smart contract applications | Hedera\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Smart contracts are an essential element of blockchain technology. They allow developers to create on-chain applications to be executed when specific parameters are met. 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