Santander’s Ripple payment service to launch this week

Santander promises to launch the new payment system by Friday. With hopes to cross borders in both geography and innovation, the group is excited about the project backed by Ripple developed technology.

Reports from Financial Times indicate that the multinational banking corporation Santander Group is looking to launch the recently announced strategy for streamlining international payment services.

The application, One Pay FX, is set for a full launch in Spain, Brazil, Poland, and the United Kingdom – which covers approximately half of the yearly FX transfers made by individual customers in the Santander group – and will be introducing the services for small businesses in other countries in later months. Santander executive chairman Ana Botín has said that there are aims to make it available as a standalone app with the potential for customers to use at other banks.

The application is based on blockchain and will use ledger technology developed by Ripple, a California-based startup which has been making massive cryptowaves recently, and hopes to allow users to have insight into the exact amount of money that will arrive to a destination before the transfer is made. One Pay also aims to speed up the transfer process- instead of taking several days to move money, the recipient would receive the funds that day or the following.

Botín is particularly excited about this project which has taken two years to develop, saying that the technology based on blockchain “offers tremendous opportunities to improve the services we offer our customers, and the launch of Santander One Pay FX is the first of many potential applications”. She is optimistic about its success, adding that the bank is focusing on making transfers instant in numerous markets by the time summer rolls around.

Santander is aware that although this technology is still at a stage of innovation, other banks using Blockchain to stay ahead of the financial game is a reality. Botín confirmed this saying that “innovation is going to continue and you have to be ahead of the pack”.

If Santander manage to maintain innovative designs in blockchain, and are able introduce customers to ease of cryptopayments and digital money transfers, the success in leading the pack will be a path well laid out.