Why machine-to-machine payments are the new electricity

Continuous machine-to-machine payments are becoming as fundamental to the digital economy as electricity is to industry. Machines will transact without human involvement, making decisions, coordinating with one another and purchasing what they need in real time.

Sensors and satellites will sell data streams by the second, and factories will price power purchases in real time based on supply and demand. This future cannot be built on large, infrequent payments. It needs billions of tiny, continuous transactions executed autonomously at machine speed.

Microtransactions will make full automation economically viable, turning value exchange into something ambient and infrastructure-like rather than a series of discrete billing events. Blockchains are the rails for those microtransactions and must be treated like a power grid: near-zero fees, very low latency and predictable performance.