Mission of Hyperledger Project (“HLP”).

The mission of HLP is to:

a. create an enterprise grade, open source distributed ledger framework and code base, upon which users can build and run robust, industry-specific applications, platforms and hardware systems to support business transactions.

b. create an open source, technical community to benefit the ecosystem of HLP solution providers and users, focused on blockchain and shared ledger use cases that will work across a variety of industry solutions;

c. promote participation of leading members of the ecosystem, including developers, service and solution providers and end users; and

d. host the infrastructure for HLP, establishing a neutral home for community infrastructure, meetings, events and collaborative discussions and providing structure around the business and technical governance of HLP.

...

Governance

HLP shall be composed of Premier, General and Associate Members. All Premier and General Members must be current corporate members of The Linux Foundation (at any level) to participate in HLP as a member. Anyone may propose a contribution to HLP’s technical codebase regardless of membership status. All participants in HLP, including Associate Members, enjoy the privileges and undertake the obligations described in this Hyperledger Project Charter, as from time to time amended by the Governing Board with the approval of The Linux Foundation (“LF”). During the term of their membership, all members will comply with all such policies as the LF Board of Directors and/or the HLP may from time to time adopt with notice to members.

...

Licensing

a. Members agree that all new inbound code contributions to HLP shall be made under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (available at http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0). All contributions shall be accompanied by a Developer Certificate of Origin sign-off (http://developercertificate.org) that is submitted through a Governing Board and LF-approved contribution process. Such contribution process will include steps to also bind non-Member Contributors and, if not self-employed, their employer, to the licenses expressly granted in the Apache License, Version 2.0 with respect to such contribution.

b. All outbound code will be made available under the Apache License, Version 2.0.

...

I found the copy on the landing page to be too fancy and ornate to be useful. From a brief glance, it seems that they want to tie as many businesses together as possible into one private blockchain-based network in order to make payment verification and settlement quicker/more secure. Banks are already looking into this and exploring their own private blockchain network. [1]

This means that all payments to and from companies within the hyperledger network will be recorded and made known to all other participants in the network. If it works they will move on to transparently recording production logs, which will ostensibly help in keeping producers honest about their manufacturing process and help drive down error tolerance.

Two main problems I see immediately:

1. Tiered supply chains are so complex that it will require a huge onboarding effort to get enough companies on the ledger to make it useful to any one company.

2. Companies, much like individuals, love privacy! I'm assuming the protocol will include some type of identity-cloaking cryptographical overhead that will increase latency/complexity and reduce the benefit of having an open ledger.

Still, a really cool idea and application of blockchain tech that will be a great experiment of building a massive, ambitious network from scratch.

[1] http://www.wired.com/2015/12/big-tech-joins-big-banks-to-cre...