THE RIPPLE MOBILE APP IN JAPAN
Most people who keep a close eye on Ripple know the company is making inroads in Asia as of right now. Its technology is of great interest to a lot of banks and financial service providers in the region, especially in Japan. A fair few banks are experimenting with this technology right now, although no real-world use cases have been made public so far.
That situation will come to change very soon, thanks to a new Japanese mobile app. Known as MoneyTap, this application is powered by Ripple’s blockchain technology. Customers of any institution that is part of the Japan Bank Consortium will be able to settle transactions instantly, 24/7. It is a big step forward for the banking industry as a whole.
It is also the first mobile application of this magnitude in Japan. Getting different banks to use the same mobile application for this purpose has not been done before. Even though all of these institutions have seen merit in Ripple’s technology, creating a unified banking ecosystem has never been easy, nor will it be for the foreseeable future.
As one would expect, not all of these five dozen banks will go live with this mobile application from the beginning. Instead, only three will take the plunge, with others to follow. SBI Net Sumishin Bank, Resona Bank, and Suruga Bank will be the “guinea pigs” to trial this new Ripple-powered app in the real world. It is expected this will occur at some point during the autumn of 2018, although no specific date has been announced yet.
Assuming this application proves to be successful, banking in Japan will look a lot different in a few months from now. Considering that the Japan Bank Consortium controls over 80% of all banking assets in Japan, this new application will be a complete game-changer for all parties involved. Instant transaction settlement around the clock will be something a lot of customers of these banks will thoroughly appreciate.
It also appears this will be one of the first real-world use cases for the XRP asset in the banking world. Although it is unclear in what capacity the native asset will be used, it seems that XRP is of great importance in instantly settling cross-bank transfers. For the time being, we will have to wait and see how this application performs and evolves. It is a big step in the right direction for Ripple as a company, and it will bring positive attention to what it is doing exactly.