Blockchain in Action : Round-up of blockchain stories from Sep 2017

With every passing month in 2017 , the blockchain action is only accelerating with more interesting applications and use cases of how blockchain technologies are being leveraged to driven innovations and transformations.

In this post I am sharing a round-up of some of the interesting stories of blockchain in action for Sep 2017.

Intel, Tencent Sign Letter of Intent For Blockchain Technology Collaboration

On Sunday, Intel and Tencent signed a letter of intent for a blockchain collaboration, according to Chinese media. Announced at the 2017 World Internet of Things Exposition, the endeavor will focus on applications for Tencent’s TUSI Internet of Things laboratory.

iFlyer and Sony Music Partner EventChain for Blockchain Ticketing Solutions in Asia

Blockchain technology continues to burst into new and established markets as now Sony Music Entertainment Japan has decided to partner with a well-known Japanese-based e-ticketing start-up iFLYER who will be working with EventChain. EventChain will be bringing their Blockchain expertise to a sector of the entertainment business that could benefit hugely from an immutable ledger such as the Ethereum Blockchain.

Swiss Telecom Giant Launches New Blockchain Business

Swisscom, according to new reports, has established "Swisscom Blockchain AG" to focus on a range of services around the tech. These include enterprise-facing solutions as well as support for companies looking to launch initial coin offerings (ICOs). The move comes months after the telecom joined the Hyperledger blockchain project. Swisscom is also a member of a Switzerland-based blockchain consortium that also includes exchange operator SIX and Zürcher Kantonalbank, the country’s fourth-largest bank. In January, that group unveiled an ethereum-based trading tool for over-the-counter exchanges.

Changing Entertainment with Blockchain: Project CIRCLE

Project CIRCLE is a movement to develop the most fun and exciting gaming platform using blockchain. Users will not only be able to wager on predicting various future events but can also suggest their original predicting events and receive rewards. The team aims to have their token listed on major exchanges, but most importantly to change the concept of entertainment using the blockchain technology, for the industry’s further development.

The world's first blockchain smartphone is in development

Sirin Labs, the company behind the $14,000 Solarin smartphone, is now developing an open-source model that runs on a fee-less blockchain. The Finney -- named in honor of bitcoin pioneer Hal Finney -- will be the only smartphone in the world that's fully secure and safe enough to hold cryptographic coins. Or so says the company, which is launching a crowdsale event this October (date to be confirmed) to support the phone's development.

Monaco Launches Mobile App to Bring Cryptocurrencies to Every Wallet

Monaco, a pioneering payments and cryptocurrency player, today announced the launch of the Monaco app, giving consumers a radically simplified way to buy, spend, and earn cryptocurrency cashback on all transactions. Together with the Monaco card that will be rolling out later in September, the platform is based on perfect interbank exchange rates, and enables users to save up to 8 percent on all foreign currency transactions.

Bitcoin: Blockchain eyes India

Blockchain announced a partnership with Unocoin — one of the largest crypto-currency platforms in India — to enter the Indian market. While in India, Unocoin processes transactions worth more than ₹600 million every month for its over four lakh customers, Blockchain’s global platform has upwards of 16.5 million users.

Blockchain wallet Jaxx adds support for Edgeless Casino token

The team of blockchain wallet application Jaxx announced today they will be adding support for the Edgeless Casino token. Edgeless.io is the first Ethereum-based casino. Edgeless leverages blockchain technology to offer players a completely transparent and 0% house edge wagering experience.

IBM Joins Automakers, Banks in Blockchain Wallet Project Expansion

IBM has joined car manufacturer ZF Friedrichshafen and investment bank UBS in an effort to build and develop a blockchain-based mobile payment system for the automotive industry. The partnership is being positioned as one that conceives how driverless vehicles might automatically authorize payments, as well as act as a digital operator for the vehicle, in the future.

DomRaider Looking to Revolutionize Auctions Through Blockchain

DomRaider has built a very successful multi-national auction house for domain names that have expired or lapsed. The company is seeking to create a new auction platform based on Blockchain technology. This platform would bring together the auction world with the power of Blockchain technology to revolutionize how auctions are processed.

Euroclear Alternative Seeks Public Listing for Blockchain Securities

Solidum is gearing up to take its blockchain-based securities public. The insurance-linked securities specialist built its blockchain platform after losing its connection to Euroclear last year, and now sees the platform as a way for other providers like itself to offer similarly sized investments that traditional settlement companies might typically turn away. Now, the company is working to open the door to issuing larger dollar amounts to more investors by becoming a "listing member" of The International Stock Exchange (TISE), based in Guernsey, a British Crown dependency.

SBI Ripple Asia Plots Instant International Blockchain Payments in South Korea

SBI Ripple Asia, a joint-venture company established by Japanese financial giant SBI Holdings and San Francisco-based FinTech startup Ripple is gearing to bring Ripple’s enterprise blockchain solutions for cross-border payments in the South Korea-Japan corridor and wider global markets. It will begin testing a new blockchain-based remittance platform between Japanese and South Korean banks by the end of the year.

New alliance advocates the blockchain to improve IoT security, trust

The Trusted IoT Alliance published a press release this morning announcing its official launch, describing itself as a conglomerate of companies that will develop standards for the blockchain network, organize pilot blockchain programs, and share source code for further blockchain development. The alliance is comprised of Fortune 500 companies including Bosch, BNY Mellon, Cisco, Chronicled, IOTA, U.S. Bank and HCM International of Foxconn Group, among others. The purpose of the alliance is to establish an "open source blockchain protocol to support IoT technology in major industries worldwide," according to the press release.

SmartOne Launches Legal Solution for Crypto Community – Announce LEGAL Tokens

SmartOne, based in Lichtenstein, has been working to solve the problem of a lack of access to suitable legal services for the crypto community. The result of their work is LEGAL, a new Ethereum-based token that operates the SmartOne Protocol. LEGAL provides discounted access to a marketplace that works for the crypto community by making legal services both easily accessible and suitable for Blockchain-based businesses.

LEVERJ Announces Fully Functional, Non-Custodial Cryptocurrency Derivatives Trading Platform

Leverj, a decentralized platform for cryptocurrency derivatives trading, which is supported by ConsenSys, the world’s largest Blockchain venture studio – plans to unveil its highly anticipated platform to traders interested in leveraged cryptocurrency trading. The Seychelles-based project will enable users to place and manage positions on digital currencies, as well as futures on major equities indices and single stock futures, all in a decentralized way

Big Pharma Turns to Blockchain to Track Meds

On Thursday, a group of companies announced the MediLedger Project, which is creating blockchain tools to manage pharmaceutical supply chains. The group, which includes drug giants Genentech and Pfizer, has already completed a successful pilot program to track medicines. If the project meets its goals, everyone from drug makers to wholesalers to hospitals will be recording drug deliveries on a blockchain.

Cypherium Announces Development of a Scalable, Hybrid Blockchain

Lead blockchain cryptographers have banded together with experts from companies such as Google, Amazon & Microsoft to create Cypherium. Building off Emin Gun Sirer and Bryan Ford’s work on the Bitcoin-NG and ByzCoin protocols, Cypherium aims to be a market-ready solution for scalability. Cypherium is comprised of experienced technologists possessing extensive background in cryptography, decentralized networking and software architecture.

GSA looks to blockchain for speeding procurement processes

While best known for financial applications, blockchain has public-sector use cases that range from supply chain to public records. The General Services Administration may soon add one more, as GSA is looking into how distributed ledger technology can speed up the FASt Lane process for IT Schedule 70 contracts through automation.

Centers for Disease Control to Launch First Blockchain Test on Disaster Relief

For public health practitioners, the ability to quickly collect, analyze and take action on data is paramount to containing the spread of a deadly new virus or disease. Now in search of a better solution, Nasr is eyeing a blockchain proof-of-concept he believes could facilitate the more rapid and reliable capture of epidemiological data in crisis situations. Jim Nasr is  chief software architect at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the arm of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services tasked with combating the spread of preventive and chronic disease.

KfW uses blockchain for money market issue

KfW has issued its first euro commercial paper using distributed ledger technology. The pilot transaction was led by Commerzbank and sold to MEAG, the asset manager of Munich Re and ERGO, as part of a test of the new technology in the sale of money market instruments.

Port of Rotterdam Authority launches field lab to develop blockchain solutions

The Port of Rotterdam Authority has partnered with the Municipality of Rotterdam in the Netherlands to introduce a field lab to develop applications and solutions using blockchain technology. The newly launched BlockLab initiative is set to receive funding from the Municipality of Rotterdam and will be supported by regional development corporation Innovation Quarter.

AB-CHAIN’s Cryptocurrency Makes Advertising Easy

AB-CHAIN is a new generation advertising network that allows advertisers to buy ad space from publishers using cryptocurrencies including a new currency called the ABC token. AB-CHAIN will provide companies that have raised money through ICOs with an ad network where they can buy online advertising using multiple types of cryptocurrencies and without the need to convert them to fiat. This avoids problems such as low liquidity in crypto market causing the value to fall when converted and local governments charges taxes over conversion of cryptocurrencies to fiat.

Nasdaq, SEB to test blockchain for mutual funds

Exchange group Nasdaq Inc and Nordic financial services group SEB have teamed up to test a blockchain-based mutual fund trading platform for the Swedish market in an effort to simplify and make the process faster. The platform would enable fund companies, distributors and other market participants to record all transactions and changes to mutual trades in real time on a shared digital ledger, Nasdaq and SEB said on Wednesday.

Royal Bank of Canada using blockchain for U.S./Canada payments - executive

Royal Bank of Canada (RY.TO) is experimenting with blockchain to help move payments between its U.S. and Canadian banks, one of the bank’s senior executives told Reuters on Thursday. The bank developed the system over the past six months at an RBC blockchain technology center in Toronto, deploying software developed by a cross-industry open-source blockchain consortium known as Hyperledger.

Israel’s Biggest Bank Partners Microsoft to Offer Bank Guarantees on a Blockchain

Microsoft is partnering with Israel’s Bank Hapoalim on a blockchain-based platform to support digital bank guarantees for customers, according to The Times of Israel. Bank Hapoalim becomes the first Israeli bank to deploy blockchain technology in financial contracts, the lender noted in a statement. The project will simplify and hasten the process of signing up guarantors. Bank customers in need of a bank guarantee typically have to go to a branch, transfer the guarantee to the beneficiary, then return it to the bank in the event the guarantee is not used.

Shipping Logistics Firm Completes Successful Blockchain Pilot

Freight forwarder Marine Transport International (MTI) has completed a successful blockchain pilot program to automate and digitize the entire supply chain process on a decentralized distributed ledger. MTI has announced details of a blockchain pilot wherein multiple parties – the supplier, shipper, load point, customs and terminal authorities, were able to access real-time data over an interoperable blockchain

Indian State of Andhra Pradesh Embraces Blockchain for Protecting Citizen Information

The next application of Blockchain technology in India, however, has been announced as a partnership between the seventh largest Indian state, Andhra Pradesh (AP), and WiseKey, a Blockchain security company. The goal of the initiative is to help manage the privacy of citizens’ personal information being stored on state databases.

Ukrainian ministry carries out first blockchain transactions

Ukraine’s justice ministry carried out trial auctions using blockchain technology for the first time on Wednesday, part of an effort to improve transparency in government transactions. The project is part of a broader drive by the Ukrainian authorities to modernize state institutions and eliminate corruption, in exchange for a $40 billion bailout from the International Monetary fund and other donors.

Are there any other stories of blockchain in action that you have read or seen in Sep 2017? Leave a comment / link below.

NOTE: Content in this post has been curated from the links referenced in the article