MADRID, Nov. 14, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- IBM (NYSE: IBM)
today announced work underway with leading European companies to
continue to innovate with blockchain, progressing projects from
proof of concept to production environments.
The attributes of blockchain technology are ideally suited to
large networks of disparate partners. A distributed ledger
technology, blockchain establishes a shared, immutable record of
all the transactions that take place within a network and then
enables permissioned parties access to trusted data in real time.
By applying the technology to a variety of business processes, a
new form of command and consent can be introduced into the flow of
information, empowering multiple partners to collaborate and
establishing a single shared view of a transaction without
compromising details, privacy or confidentiality.
The hallmark of IBM's blockchain business has been the ability
to convene broad groups of network participants to embrace a
collaborative platform approach to blockchain adoption. Clients are
capitalising on the opportunity for greater trust and transparency
using blockchain across a variety of industries, for example to
better manage the reconciliation of international mobile phone
roaming charges, securing digital identity for citizens, and
complying with new European banking directives on customer
communications.
With more than 500 blockchain projects globally, IBM is engaged
across all industries, where European projects in particular are on
the rise, where, according to IDC, "blockchain spending in
Europe is now growing faster than
anywhere else."1
"From large enterprises to start-ups, across multiple
industries, businesses across Europe are selecting IBM Blockchain," said
Andrew Darley, IBM Blockchain
Platform Leader, Europe. "Clients
are attracted by the production-readiness of the IBM Blockchain
Platform, allowing them to run highly secure networks in any
environment of their choosing, on premise, via IBM Cloud, or an
increasing number of other industry cloud providers."
European clients are continuing to work with IBM to drive
blockchain innovation in their industries:
Telefónica and IBM are
collaborating in the development of a proof of concept (PoC) based
on IBM blockchain technology to help solve one of the major
challenges of communications service providers, the management of
international mobile phone call traffic. The project helps to
resolve the veracity and traceability of information generated by
different service providers when they route an international call.
Using a decentralized network that provides participating members
secure access, fraudulent behaviors and discrepancies between
the information recorded by each provider are significantly
reduced.
The Central Bank of the Republic
of Azerbaijan and IBM are
developing a Digital Identification System based on Hyperledger
Fabric, A Linux Foundation framework, to verify the reliability of
the documents related to both individuals and legal entities for
use with banks, credit providers and similar organizations. The new
system will simplify and automate the "Know Your Customer"
validation process, and will be used by both clients and credit
organizations serving citizens of Azerbaijan.
Finnish retail cooperative S-Group
is testing their Pike-perch radar solution, which is based
on IBM Blockchain technology, as part of the retail group's
strategy to improve customer experience. Customers in Finland can trace a fillet of pike or perch
freshwater fish back to its home waters using the QR Code on the
package of "Kotimaista-kuhafile" fish, or by logging in to a
tracking website.
PKO Bank Polski has implemented a
blockchain-based "durable medium" platform built together with
KIR (Krajowa Izba Rozliczeniowa S.A. - Polish automated
clearing house) in partnership with IBM and Accenture, to help the
bank achieve compliance with the European Union Payment Services
Directive related to customer communication. Now the client
documents and communications sent digitally to more than 5 million
customers of the bank will be held in a highly secure
blockchain-based repository.
The Central Securities Depository
of Poland (Krajowy Depozyt
Papierow Wartosciowych, KDPW) has implemented their eVoting
solution, designed to encourage greater retail shareholder
participation in company Annual General Meetings (AGM), and ensure
transparency to regulators on the history of AGM agendas, and
voting results. The network is in production.
Startup software developer
Comgo.io, with support from IBM, is digitizing the entire donation
and spend process for Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) using
Hyperledger Fabric. NGO donors can see in real time what money has
already been spent and the activities supported. For example, when
charity workers in India purchase
hygiene products for the street children they support, the payment
is tracked on a mobile phone, and written to the blockchain,
allowing approved network participants to see the transactions, and
triggering the NGO responsible to verify that the children did
actually receive the products. The application enhances
transparency to build a deeper connection between the donors and
the charity, and helps donors to understand more about the work of
the NGO. Comgo.io is implementing the application with 7 NGOs:
Fundación Recover; Orden de Malta;
Fundación Exit; Farmacéuticos sin Fronteras; KUBUKA; Itwillbe, and
homelessentrepreneur.
Much of the momentum can be attributed to the ease of use of the
IBM Blockchain Platform and the open nature of the Linux
Foundation's Hyperledger Fabric blockchain framework, underscored
by IBM's deep blockchain and industry expertise.
Services and developer resources throughout Europe help support clients through IBM Client
Centres and Blockchain Garages in London and Böblingen; IBM Client Innovation
Centres in Paris, Nice and Gronningen; an Industry Solution
Centre in Montpellier; IBM Food Trust network cloud center in
Frankfurt. IBM Research centres in
Zurich and Dublin focus on cryptography, innovations in
AI and optical imaging to help prove the identity and authenticity
of objects, detect anomalies and support preventative maintenance
in industrial environments. At the Watson IoT Center in
Munich clients are engaged on
projects to explore the convergence of IoT and blockchain, and how
clients can automate business processes, gain competitive
advantage, and create new business models, by embedding end point
and sensor data into blockchain networks to trigger smart
contracts.
Clients can also benefit from the availability of IBM Blockchain
Starter Plan on IBM Cloud, starting from approximately €500 a
month. This is helping developers, startups and enterprises build
blockchain proofs-of-concept quickly and affordably with an
end-to-end blockchain development experience, a secure test
environment, suite of education tools and modules and one-click
network provisioning.
IBM Blockchain Platform was named "Best Blockchain Platform" by
Juniper Research in their Future Digital Awards.
About IBM Blockchain
IBM is recognized as the leading enterprise blockchain provider.
The company's research, technical and business experts have broken
barriers in transaction processing speeds, developed the most
advanced cryptography to secure transactions, and are contributing
millions of lines of open source code to advance blockchain for
businesses. IBM is the leader in open-source blockchain solutions
built for the enterprise. Since 2016, IBM has worked with hundreds
of clients across financial services, supply chain, government,
retail, digital rights management and healthcare to implement
blockchain applications, and operates a number of networks running
live and in production. The cloud-based IBM Blockchain Platform
delivers the end-to-end capabilities that clients need to quickly
activate and successfully develop, operate, govern and secure their
own business networks. IBM is an early member of Hyperledger, an
open source collaborative effort created to advance cross-industry
blockchain technologies. For more information about IBM Blockchain,
visit https://www.ibm.com/blockchain/ or follow us on Twitter at
@ibmblockchain.
Contact information:
Vince Smith
IBM Communications
smithv@uk.ibm.com
+44 7802 216940
Notes to Editors:
Previous recently announced European IBM Blockchain clients
include:
- Valenciaport, who joined TradeLens 5 November [LINK]
- Carrefour, who joined IBM Food Trust 8 October [LINK].
- we.trade, who joined forces with three former Batavia
consortium banks on 2 October, accelerating the development of its
blockchain-based trade financing platform and extending its reach
to 14 countries across Europe.
[LINK] More recently on 31 October they also signed an MOU with
eTradeConnect in Asia to
interconnect the two platforms for trade transactions, extending
the combined network to 26 banks. [LINK] The we.trade and Batavia
platforms run on IBM Blockchain Platform.
1 IDC report, "Six Reasons Why Blockchain Will Follow
a Unique Adoption Pattern in Europe", August 2018. Document
#EMEA44214418
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SOURCE IBM