A consortium of international banks and IBM has successfully conducted its first live cross-border transactions involving corporate clients on a blockchain-based trade finance platform.
Batavia was founded by banking giant UBS in partnership with IBM Blockchain in 2016. Bank of Montreal (BMO), CaixaBank, Commerzbank and Erste Group later joined it and formed a consortium to advance its technological development.
Initial transactions included the trading of cars from Germany to Spain, and textile raw materials for furniture production from Austria to Spain, Bank of Montreal (BMO) announced Thursday.
Batavia carried out the full cycle of trades, automatically forming agreements and closing payments, in a process powered by smart contracts and with transactions recorded on a blockchain.
The pilot transactions were conducted with a variety of transportation modes, geographies and trading parties of various sizes.
These transactions mark an important step in establishing Batavia as an open ecosystem that is built on the IBM Blockchain Platform. It has the potential to revolutionize the client experience by providing a digital and automated way of arranging, securing and financing international trade transactions.
As part of Batavia's move toward a production-ready solution, the project is eyeing wider industry collaboration to include more financial institutions and fintech startups.
Earlier this week, India's private sector banking giant ICICI had announced that more than 250 corporate customers have joined its custom-developed blockchain platform for domestic and international trade finance.
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