The Linux Foundation-led Hyperledger Project has signed up 30 founding members from the technology and financial services sectors, with several donating code to the effort to build a cross-industry open standard for distributed ledgers.
First unveiled in December under the Open Ledger Project moniker, the effort aims to "advance blockchain technology" through an open standard that will support virtually any digital exchange with value.
Renamed, the project has boosted its founding membership from 20 to 30, with financial services giants such as ABN Amro, the DTCC, Deutsche Bourse and Swift joining tech firms like Accenture and IBM and blockchain specialists such as Digital Asset Holdings and the R3 group.
Meanwhile, technical contributions will be reviewed by a new steering committee that will oversee the project’s technical direction and working groups as well as manage multiple contributions to the code base. In addition, a board of directors will guide business decisions and marketing and ensure alignment between the technical communities and members.
Jim Zemlin, executive director, Linux Foundation, says: "Working on its own even the largest global corporation could not match the speed at which our new members are moving blockchain technology forward. Such a broad effort and investment is sure to have a great impact on our personal and professional lives."
Separately, another blockchain consortium is in the works for the mutual fund industry in the UK. According to the FT, Schroders Investment Management and Aberdeen Asset Management, Columbia Threadneedle Investmentsn Aviva Investors and Henderson Global Investors are exploring ways that distributed ledgers could be used to reduce back-end manual processing and in trading of illiquid securities.