The R3 blockchain consortium came under fire last week, due to a rather surprising amount of member departures. Despite all of the negative attention, there are positive developments to take note of as well. A new partnership with Calypso Technology will see the consortium develop a multi-party trade confirmation system. Underpinning this project will be the Corda blockchain, which will be open sourced in a few weeks.
R3 And Calypso Team Up For Blockchain Project
Calypso is the first application partner for the R3 blockchain consortium, which is quite surprising. After over a year of developing the Corda blockchain solution, most experts thought the group would have multiple partners lined up by now. Unfortunately, that is not the case, and it seemed unlikely a few days ago that it would happen.
With seven of its founding members leaving the project, the future of R3 came into question. However, it appears that those concerns were unjustified, as this partnership comes exactly at the right time. Developing a multiparty trade confirmation system on top of the Corda blockchain with smart contracts sounds like an exciting development.
Counterparties will be able to see all trade tickets issued on this distributed ledger, ensuring that the correct trades are executed. Multiple financial institutions will take part in the initial testing phase, which will run for an undisclosed period. Merging traditional capital markets vendors with disruptive technologies can only lead to the creation of great projects in the end.
Calypso CEO Pascal Xatart told the media:
“We are thrilled to be working with R3 and honored to be their first application partner. The alignment between the two firms is exceptional–our deep expertise in capital markets combined with their industry-leading distributed ledger technology will allow us to develop a range of innovative applications quickly and efficiently. Our current matching solution is only the beginning.”
Even though this partnership should put R3 back on track for the fundraising effort they are expected to complete, it remains doubtful that their US$150m target will be reached. Members of the consortium have contributed just under US$60m, which shows that there is very little confidence in the Corda blockchain at the moment. Moreover, the code will only be open sourced once the fundraising has concluded, which is not a positive sign for potential investors.
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