SHANGHAI, Sept. 23, 2016
/CNW/ -- At the Shanghai International Blockchain Week 2016,
IBM (NYSE: IBM) and China UnionPay E-payment Research Institute
previewed the demo of a collaborative project on loyalty bonus
points exchange among multiple banks using blockchain
technology. With a few simple and quick steps, consumers will
be able to exchange bonus points from among any of the banks they
do business with to select the rewards they want.
Bonus points earned through purchases on bank cards have long
been an important method to attract and encourage customer loyalty
to branded bank cards. The variety and selection of merchandise
available in online bonus points exchange shops are an important
reason for customers to favor and use specific bank cards.
Since bonus points cannot be freely exchanged among different
banks, many bonus points go unused because of strict bonus points
policies or a limited selection of goods for exchange.
Enabling banks to integrate and share bonus point systems can be
a challenging and expensive task using conventional technology. To
address this problem and provide more value for bank customers, IBM
China Research Lab and China UnionPay E-payment Institute created
an innovative business platform on IBM Blockchain using the
Hyperledger Fabric to create a permissioned network for the
exchange of bonus points.
"As a new industry pilot for blockchain technology, this
represents a significant business breakthrough and innovation
milestone for the electronic payment business," said He Shuo,
Director, the Electronic Payment Research Institute, China
UnionPay. "The joint research efforts between China UnionPay
E-payment Institute and IBM Research has enabled the successful
exchange of bonus points among banks using blockchain technology,
which embeds trust into transactions. This pilot along with similar
innovations underway using blockchain will positively change the
future of the finance industry."
This joint effort will also integrate online and offline
channels using blockchain. As a result, it will be possible for
China UnionPay card holders to go to any offline supermarket or
mall equipped with intelligent point-of-service (POS) devices to
exchange bonus points for commodities by direct scanning. It is
anticipated that bonus points from flight mileage, mobile phone
bills, gas cards and food and beverage purchases can be freely
exchanged and swapped in the future.
"The combination of blockchain technology and expertise from IBM
coupled with an innovative business approach by China UnionPay in
the payment industry has resulted in a significant first of a kind
demonstration of blockchain technology in the financial payments
industry," said Dr. Shen Xiaowei,
Director of IBM Research - China,
CTO of IBM Greater China Group. "IBM is partnering with the
Hyperledger Project to build an open source, enterprise-grade
blockchain platform and is helping clients define and develop more
industry use cases. In time, we expect this to result in widespread
adoption of permissioned blockchain networks to solve a number of
business challenges."
China UnionPay is a core transfer, settlement and clearing
organization in China's bank card
industry, and its transfer, settlement and clearing network
operates in over 150 countries. As a subordinate research institute
of China UnionPay, the Electronic Payment Research Institute is
responsible for research and evaluation of cutting-edge technology
and mode in payment market, study and proof of core technologies
and models for payment industry in the future, rehearsal and
analysis of proactive and basic technologies that impact the
payment industry. It is driving the adoption of new technologies
including blockchain, intelligent terminals, big data, and trusted
execution environment in financial payment.
IBM is rapidly expanding its blockchain consulting services and
capabilities and actively working with clients to understand what
it takes to make blockchain ready for business. Through its open
source contributions and resources for blockchain software
developers, IBM is advancing the science of blockchain, helping to
remove complexity, and making it more accessible and open.
Financial services, supply chains, IoT, risk management, digital
rights management and healthcare are some of the areas that are
poised for dramatic change using blockchain networks.
About IBM
For more information about IBM Blockchain, visit
www.ibm.com/blockchain.
Contacts:
Holli Haswell
IBM Media Relations
1-720-396-5485
hhaswell@us.ibm.com
Niu Yantao
IBM Greater China Group
+8610 63613205
Yantniu@cn.ibm.com
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SOURCE IBM