Hong Kong Insurance Firm AIA Joins R3 Blockchain Consortium
New York-based R3, the blockchain startup heading the prominent private banking blockchain consortium has now added Hong Kong-based life insurance group AIA.
Blockchain startup R3 is continuing its foray to recruit Asian financial institutions with the addition of AIA Group, a Hong Kong-based life insurance group to its roster of global members.
The AIA Group, the largest publicly listed independent pan-Asian life insurance group will collaborate with 50 of the world’s largest financial institutions, including banks, to develop blockchain-based commercial applications for the financial services industry.
With the latest inclusion, R3 CEO David Rutter spoke about the diversification of the blockchain consortium’s growing member network, beyond geographical leaps. He stated:
By collaborating with a broad range of non-bank institutions in addition to our extensive banking partners, we will ensure the technology being developed in our lab represents the different interests and requirements of the vast array of players in the global financial ecosystem.
The global network of R3 partners will be “united in its lab environment” at the research and development phase at the R3 Lab and Research Centre, where the likes of smart contract blockchain Corda was developed.
Citing R3’s collective expertise in fields including distributed ledger research, security & scalability, AIA chief operations officer Simeon Preston stated:
R3 provides us the possibility to understand together with other leading global organisations in financial services the potential applications of blockchain technology around the world and particularly the Asia-Pacific region.
In recent times, R3 has notably added the first ever Chinese member of the consortium. The Ping An Group, China’s second-largest insurer joined Japan’s SBI Holdings and South Korean bank holding firm Hana Financial, as Asian members of the R3-led consortium. R3 also added the first Latin American member of the group in Brazilian bank Itaú Unibanco, in April 2016.
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