Tech corporations are seeing big opportunities in the blockchain space, and are now in a closely contested race to seize them sooner rather than later.

Oracle Corp. (ORCL) has announced that it will unveil its blockchain software later this month, reports Bloomberg. Oracle will launch its platform-as-a-service blockchain product later this month, which will be followed by launch of the decentralized ledger-based applications next month.

The Redwood City, California-based software giant is already having clients on board for its blockchain offerings. Santiago-based Banco de Chile is one of the early clients that Oracle is working with to record inter-bank transactions on a hyperledger. The world’s second-largest software company is also working with the government of Nigeria, which is aiming to document customs and import duties on a blockchain. Oracle is also hopeful of offering solutions to a large number of pharmaceutical companies to efficiently track and locate batches of drugs to help them reduce the number of recalls. Thomas Kurian, president of product development, said that Oracle’s products will be compatible with other platforms.

The Rise of 'Blockchain as a Service'

However, this is not Oracle’s first attempt in the blockchain services space. Last year, it launched a cloud-based service that was built on the open-source Hyperledger Fabric project.

The number of technology companies getting into the blockchain space with new product and service offerings continues to increase, as more and more businesses across various industry sectors are embracing the blockchain technology.

Yesterday, during its ongoing three-day long annual Microsoft Build conference in Seattle, Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) unveiled its Azure Markeplace Workbench, which allows developers to quickly build blockchain-based applications using a few clicks. Earlier in April, Amazon.com Inc.’s (AMZN) Amazon Web Services (AWS) launched the hosted “blockchain-as-a-service” (BaaS) offering. Similar to hosting a website on a web hosting service provider, BaaS offers ready to use blockchain templates, data storage containers, computational power, content delivery mechanisms and blockchain management and hosting services. (See also: All About Amazon's New Blockchain Service.)

Is the Blockchain Space Overcrowded?

Around the same time, Huawei, the leading global information and communications technology solutions provider, made similar announcement to launch its Hyperledger-based blockchain service in China. In March, Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce.com Inc. (CRM), announced plans to introduce a blockchain product this fall at its Deamforce conference.

Chinese companies like Baidu Inc. (BIDU) and Tencent Holdings have similar offerings. During March of last year, International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) became the first global company to launch its Hyperledger-based BaaS offering. (See also: IBM Planning to Use Blockchain to Track Diamonds.)

As blockchain adoption remains in its nascent stage across sectors, the opportunity for such technology providers appears huge despite the blockchain space getting crowded with big name as well as multiple specialized startups. (See also: Microsoft Unveils Azure Blockchain Workbench Tools.)