Infosys Finacle partners with Emirates NBD and ICICI Bank to Launch Blockchain Pilot Network
October 2016 by Emmanuelle Lamandé
EdgeVerve Systems, a subsidiary of Infosys, Emirates NBD and ICICI Bank Limited announced the pilot launch of blockchain network for international remittances and trade finance. Both, Emirates NBD and ICICI Bank run Finacle solutions suite and have leveraged the blockchain framework to route business transaction between the two entities for remittances and trade finance business.
Using the EdgeVerve Blockchain Framework for Financial Services, the network was successfully piloted on the UAE-India remittance corridor, one of the busiest corridors for both banks. According to the World Bank, this corridor is the largest receiver of remittances with a share of close to 70 Billion USD out of the 580+ Billion USD world over.
With this, Emirates NBD became the first bank in UAE and ICICI Bank, the first bank in India, to pilot a blockchain-based network for financial services. The exercise was started eight weeks ago and additional use cases are being explored for the pilot. Both financial institutions have started the process towards a network consortium for further participation by interested member banks to expand the transaction network.
Considering its strong presence in the financial industry through Finacle suite of solutions, Emirates NBD and ICICI Bank chose to partner with EdgeVerve for the pilot. This framework is a permissioned asset-agnostic ledger, designed specifically for the banking sector. Blockchain-based applications built on this framework, can deliver enhanced automation across inter-organizational processes, transactional security and accuracy.
Highlights:
– With the blockchain network in place, both banks expect automation of inter-bank processes through smart contracts, secure digital exchange of documents and real-time monitoring of positions through integrated dashboards. Consequently, this will lead to significant costs savings for the business
– As part of this pilot, remittances, trade finance purchase order and invoice financing processes were executed on the blockchain network. It achieved a near real-time transfer of invoices and purchase orders in a transparent and secure manner
– The blockchain network has also been integrated with the Finacle Universal Banking Suite and other host systems within the application ecosystem in both banks
– The network model has been designed to be least disruptive to existing systems and processes in banks. This reduces complexity as it allows banks to seamlessly plug in their systems and processes to work with blockchain powered networks