One Pay FX: Santander introduces the first international money transfer service in four countries.
One Pay FX uses blockchain-based technology to provide a fast, easy and secure way to transfer money internationally - with the value, transparency and trust and service that customers expect from a bank like Santander.
The new service, known as Santander One Pay FX', allows customers to make international transfers on the same day or the next day in many cases. The service will also show you the exact amount received in the target currency before you make the transfer.
The new service uses xCurrent, a technology based on distributed ledgers from Californian company Ripple. InnoVentures, Santander's $200 million venture capital fund, invested in Ripple in 2015. In total, the fund has made over 20 investments in a number of financial technology start-ups focusing on artificial intelligence, large amounts of data, block chains, payments, financial advice, SME and automotive finance or mortgages. (press release Santander)
The Chinese payment provider LianLian International joins RippleNet.
RippleNet is the payment network that uses Ripple's blockchain technology to facilitate cross-border transactions.
Announced on February 7, Hong Kong-based LianLian International will use Ripple's xCurrent solution to offer same-day, cross-border transactions to its existing customers. The product differs from Ripple's xRapid solution, which, unlike xCurrent, uses its own XRP crypto currency. Arthur Zhu, CEO of LianLian International, said in a statement:
"With RippleNet, we will further enhance this experience by offering our customers immediate, blockchain-based payments in the 19 currencies we currently support".
According to Ripple, the partnership with LianLian will enable existing RippleNet members to connect with the Chinese market. With the news, LianLian becomes the newest member of RippleNet, which now has over 100 customers with its xCurrent solution.
Ripple has joined the Hyperledger Blockchain Consortium.
Hyperledger announced on Wednesday that Ripple is one of the fourteen companies in the group, which was founded at the end of 2015 and to date consists of more than 200 companies and organisations. The group also includes CULedger, a separate consortium supported by a group of credit cooperatives that set up an industry-oriented service company last year.
"Our partnership with Hyperledger enables developers to access the Interledger Protocol (ILP) in Java for enterprise use," said Ripple CTO Stefan Thomas in a statement.
ILP was previously only executable with JavaScript. Last year, however, Ripple entered into a collaboration with the Japanese system integrator NTT Data to convert the protocol to the Java programming language. The two companies handed over the revised Java-based protocol to Hyperledger under the new name Hyperledger Quilt.
"The Hyperledger Quilt project combines hyperledger block chains with other ILP-enabled payment systems such as XRP Ledger, Ethereum, Bitcoin (Lightning), Litecoin, Mojaloop and RippleNet and helps us to realize our vision of an Internet with added value - where money moves like information does today," Thomas explained.
2018 will be a busy year for the Hyperledger consortium. It is planned to upgrade three open source blockchain platforms to version 1.0 or production status and introduce an enterprise blockchain tool to accelerate the development of blockchain applications.
Ripple invests $2 million in blockchain research at Texas University Austin
The University of Texas at Austin is one of the first academic institutions officially sponsored by Ripple. Ripple Labs promised to raise $2 million over the next five years to support the Blockchain research.
The funding is part of the $50 million Ripple has pledged to invest in scientific blockchain research at universities around the world. Other recipients so far have been Princeton University, MIT and 14 other institutions.