IBM Launches Blockchain Pilot for Bank Guarantee Processes

Tech giant IBM has launched a pilot for a blockchain-powered platform designed to streamline bank guarantee process.

In a press release shared with Cointelegraph on July 3, IBM stated that the pilot was launched in partnership with four Australian financial services companies.

The pilot - dubbed Lygon - is backed by IBM, the Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Limited, Commonwealth Bank, real estate operator Scentre Group, and Australia's first bank Westpac.

The pilot is set to run for eight weeks for a test group of retail property leasing customers starting today.

Essentially, Lygon is a blockchain-based platform that digitizes the issuance and management of bank guarantees in the retail property lease sector.

Once the pilot is completed, Lygon plans to expand the range of digitised bank guarantees it supports and begin offering them to other industries.

"We have created a blockchain-based platform to digitize the bank guarantee ecosystem. The pilot will test live transactions using distributed ledger to prove the technology is commercially viable. It is a great example of digital transformation that refines the customer experience."

IBM has launched a number of enterprise blockchain offers to date.

Last month, CIP, a facilitator of Brazilian banking and financial infrastructure, officially launched its blockchain ID platform via a partnership with IBM using Hyperledger Fabric.

In March, five Japanese banks collaborated to roll out a financial services infrastructure based on IBM's distributed ledger technology.