India: Axis Bank to roll out Ripple payments

The solutions underlying technology will enable real-time settlement for cross-border payments, as reported by regional news source The Economic Times. This announcement comes just a few months after Axis partnered with Kotak Mahindra Bank, another Indian banking institution, to test blockchain for new client-facing services.

In October 2016, media sources reported that Axis officials were looking ahead to potential product launches utilizing the tech but demurred when asked about any potential launch dates. Over the summer in 2016, the bank had launched a new FinTech accelerator aimed, in part, at exploring new services for blockchain.

But Axis isn’t the only bank in the region pushing ahead with blockchain. Recently, Yes Bank announced that it had developed a blockchain-based vendor financing solution, leveraging the open-source Hyperledger code as a basis.