Ripple Labs is to plug its real-time settlement protocol into the Earthport payment hub, opening new channels to market for the open source transaction technology.
Under the partnership, Earthport’s customers will be able to utilise Ripple’s friction-free cross-border payments technology while operating within strict regulatory boundaries.
“We constantly evaluate new technologies to reduce costs and delays associated with global bank payments for our clients, but require these innovations to meet our high, exacting standards for compliance,” says Hank Uberoi, CEO of Earthport. “Ripple is a new technology and, once integrated in our payments service could bring benefits in efficiency and speed to global transfers. Earthport will apply its existing compliance framework, rule sets and secure payments network to any Earthport clients transacting using the Ripple protocol.”
Earthport has so far secured cross-border processing deals with two of the top five banks globally, and four of the top 20 banks in the US, which use the network to connect with up to 60 countries globally.
Ripple Labs, which has so far snared deals with two US banks and Fidor Bank in Germany, sees the partnership with Earthport as a convenient way to overcome compliance concerns and expose its technology to a wider array of banking institutions.
Chris Larsen, co-founder and CEO of Ripple Labs, says Earthport’s proven compliance platform provides an immense opportunity for international scalability given the firm's expertise in navigating local regulations.
“Traditional cross-border payments are inefficient today because both the technology and compliance frameworks underpinning them were built country by country decades ago,” he says. “The Earthport and Ripple partnership brings together the leading global payments and technology infrastructures to immediately transform and modernise the global payments industry.”