Japan Bank Consortium Moves to Become Production-ready

The revolution to drive the Internet of Value is gaining more momentum as Japan Bank Consortium (JBC) — a collection of 61 Japan-based bank members brought together by SBI Holdings and SBI Ripple Asia — announced that it’s made progress to become production-ready on RippleNet.

Soon, Japanese banks will not only be quickly onboarded with minimal effort, but also easily connect to other member banks in Ripple’s network — furthering their reach with real-time global settlement.

Each bank will have the ability to use Ripple solutions to send real-time, low-cost, transparent domestic and cross-border payments.

The progression to production-ready is not only good news for JBC, but for also for banks who want to connect to the Japanese market. Foreign banks will have visibility and predictability regarding fees and timing from payments going into and out of Japan.

Expanding network effects to deliver a better customer experience

JBC and Ripple worked together closely to create a unified platform for domestic and cross-border payments using Ripple solutions.

xCurrent — Ripple’s solution for real-time settlement — provided the technology for this new offering to reduce correspondent and operational costs, expand access to foreign banks, and increase visibility into the status of payments.

In addition, early next year JBC will release an API connection called Common Gateway that provides banks with easy access to xCurrent on the shared platform, as well as Common App. Common App is a mobile application that allows users to use a bank account number, mobile phone number or QR code to send payments.

“JBC’s progress to become production-ready is the culmination of the Ripple team’s ingenuity and dedication to modernizing payment systems, and the consortium’s desire to improve the settlement process,” said Emi Yoshikawa, Ripple’s director of joint venture partnerships.

“Now Japanese banks will be able to further their reach into RippleNet and easily connect to other banks.”