TOKYO and ARMONK, N.Y., June 25, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- AEON
Financial Service and IBM Japan (NYSE: IBM) today announced they
are building a blockchain-based financial platform for the Asian
market. With the blockchain technology, the platform is expected to
enable AEON Financial Service to provide enhanced financial
services such as settlement and transactions for both consumers and
enterprises in Japan and
throughout Asia, including virtual
currency payments between individuals and businesses, loyalty
points allocation and redemption, and transaction data
management.
AEON Financial Service, a group of the largest retail
companies in Japan, provides a
range of financial services including banking, credit and
micro-finance to customers in Japan and 11 other countries across
Asia. The company is working with
IBM to develop a new payment network for consumers and enterprises
in both Japan and the Asia region, using advanced technologies like
blockchain to provide consumers with the tools they need to seek
more prosperous lives.
"Based on settlements and transactions, AEON Financial
Service is working to build a platform that will offer various
financial services such as virtual currency payments and loyalty
points exchange and redemption not only to customers in
Japan but also throughout
Asia," said Masaaki Mangetsu,
Managing Director, Global Business Strategy, AEON Financial
Service. "We foresee great opportunities in using blockchain to
build this platform, and will aim to use it to improve our current
financial services offerings, as well as offering new services to
underserved customers in Asian countries."
"As an innovative technology, blockchain has the potential
to revolutionize ways businesses work together with their ecosystem
partners. The technology establishes accountability and
transparency while streamlining business processes," said
Yoshiki Minowa, Vice President,
Partner - Cognitive Process Transformation, Global Business
Services, IBM Japan. "We are delighted to work with AEON Financial
Service to build up a new blockchain-based platform for
innovations."
The trial will be conducted on Hyperledger Fabric, a
blockchain framework and one of the Hyperledger projects hosted by
The Linux Foundation. IBM is a Premier Member of
Hyperledger, an open source collaborative effort created
to advance cross-industry blockchain technologies. IBM
Blockchain solutions enable companies to store and share
transaction records on the blockchain, and can be governed by smart
contracts" that define transaction rules on the ledger. The
offering is underpinned by secure encryption technology that
validates transactions from the infrastructure layer. This feature
helps enable enterprises to form blockchain networks within a
specific industry and organization and build sharable models as
they work to build production networks.
In the trial, IBM Japan will provide technical support to
AEON Financial Service for the technology implementation in the
finance sector, as well as associated technology development
services. The platform will draw upon AEON's technical expertise in
networking and blockchain technology. The initial pilot will
evaluate blockchain's effectiveness across these key areas to
assess its ability to scale.
IBM Japan is dedicated to the goal of providing its
clients with a wide range of secure and convenient financial
services. AEON Financial Service expects to begin the trial of the
platform in July as the first stage of the proposed plan to develop
the platform.
About IBM
IBM is the leader in
open-source blockchain solutions built for the enterprise. As an
early member of Hyperledger, an open source collaborative effort
created to advance cross-industry blockchain technologies, IBM is
dedicated to supporting the development of openly-governed
blockchains. IBM has worked with more than 400 clients across
financial services, supply chains, IoT, risk management, digital
rights management and healthcare to implement blockchain
applications. For more information about IBM Blockchain,
visit www.ibm.com/blockchain.
CONTACT: Hannah Slocum,
978-877-0105, hslocum@us.ibm.com
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SOURCE IBM