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Swipe. Mistake. Clear.
Swipe. Mistake. Clear.
Swipe. Mistake. Clear.
The Saxby cashier pulled out a piece of parchment paper from under the register. He wrapped it around the Lehigh ID and placed it back in the GoldPLUS machine.
"Iced average coffee for Aaron," shouted a bartender.
Aaron Rotem, 19, waited patiently for the register while the cashier kept swiping his paper. He turned to see the line grow rapidly. In the end, the payment was successful and he grabbed the coffee that was ready before he even paid.
If only there was a better way.
From left, Aaron Rotem (19), Tim La Rowe (19), Matt Addessi (19), Synaptic Consulting (CTO) Jeff Anthony and Professor Hank Korth are working together on a potential replacement to upgrade the company. Lehigh's current GoldPLUS system. This project was developed as part of the Computer Science and Business program. (Alexis McGowan / B & W Staff)
Rotem, Matt Addessi, 19 and Tim LaRowe, 19, worked for a year on HawKoin, a potential replacement and upgrade to the current GoldPLUS system.
The HawKoin team presented its project to the CSE 297 class, "Blockchain Algorithms and Systems", in Packard Lab, Monday, December 3.
The project was developed by Hank Korth, professor of computer science and engineering, and Jeffrey Anthony, Chief Executive of Synaptic Consulting, as part of the culminating capstone class of the computer and business program (CSB). Both were mentors of the team.
"The purpose of the (project) is to solve a real problem in a real business for real people," Korth said.
Currently, GoldPLUS uses dial-up technology to complete payments and each transaction is processed through a third party.
While it is still under development, HawKoin would be an on-and-off-campus payment option that uses blockchain technology.
The use of blockchain would allow transactions to be faster and safer.
"It's a very heavy multi-year research project," said Addessi.
If implemented, there may be benefits for universities, students and sellers.
Lehigh would no longer have to pay a third-party or license fee for each user, as they do now for GoldPLUS, cutting costs dramatically. In addition to the money Lehigh would have saved, he would also have had the opportunity to profit if he had chosen to apply competitive rates to those of the credit card companies.
Students would have a faster and safer payment method that would be accessible from their Google accounts on their phones. Rather than using Lehigh identity cards, HawKoin transactions would be performed via QR code.
There would be a much lower transaction fee for sellers using HawKoin. At the moment, suppliers pay about five percent on each transaction with GoldPLUS, which is almost twice as expensive as a normal credit card transaction fee.
"There could be a zero percentage (transaction fee)," said LaRowe. "It could be the same as cash."
The HawKoin team spent the past six months interviewing all possible stakeholders to decide which features they wanted to secure their alternative payment. The team also met the GoldPLUS office to understand the dial-up technology used for transactions.
Team members also conducted research on both the technical and the commercial side to find the best technology to use. Once their data was collected, they started to study how to develop their platform. After many analyzes and debates, they landed on Hyperledger Fabric, a technology used by companies like Morgan Stanley and IBM.
Rotem said that Hyperledger Fabric is a distributed ledger that uses blockchain concepts to integrate the benefits of blockchain technology with the needs of a private institution.
Throughout the semester, Addessi, LaRowe and Rotem met "sprint" or weekly goals and planned for the development of the code.
During their presentation, they outlined the various phases of the project. The HawKoin team demonstrated how the transactions would work and explained some of the features of their code.
After the presentation, Anthony said he was proud to have been a mentor of this team because their teamwork and commitment paid off.
While Addessi, LaRowe and Rotem's capstone are officially made as class requirements, there are still many stages of development that are needed before HawKoin can become a reality on campus. The team recognizes it, and has made a point of outlining the next steps in their presentation.
The entire team, including Anthony and Korth, hopes the project will continue as a touchstone and a new group of students will take control in the spring.
"If the group that will work in the future will want help, I will always be there because we have been working for a year and this is a very exciting project," said Rotem. "I would like to see this project completed and implemented and in effect affect the lives of students on campus".
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