Kotak Mahindra, which is a leading Indian private sector bank, has recently announced about their collaboration with Ripple which is aimed at improving cross-border remittances of the bank. Ripple’s settlement solution of xCurrent will be used by the company which will enable it to decrease the time associated with remittance payments by several minutes.

The Chief Digital Officer of Kotak Mahindra Bank, Deepak Sharma expressed official opinion on this matter stating: “we harness new technologies to simplify and enhance banking services for our customers. xCurrent ticks all the boxes, and enables us to offer our customers a more transparent and efficient global payments service using blockchain. Joining RippleNet also expands our payment network globally by allowing us to connect with other members”.

From Ripple’s side, the South Asia Managing Director, Navin Gupta stated: “the payments problem is a global problem, particularly for those in emerging markets trying to send regular, low-value remittances overseas. Kotak Mahindra Bank can offer its retail customers a step-change improvement in their inward remittance experience thanks to xCurrent, and we look forward to connecting them to other RippleNet members to expand their global remittance offering”.

Currently there are over 25 global financial organizations that successfully use Ripple’s xCurrent solution with the main aim to enhance their customer experience when it comes to cross-border transactions.

A recent survey suggests that “India’s inward remittances have reached $69 billion during the previous financial year, which is 8 times more than its outward remittances”. Cross-border remittances are reportedly increasing in the country with each year and hence major banks of India are obtaining various blockchain technologies to advance their online transactions.

Ripple also offers another advanced technology which is called xRapid that provides liquidity for cross-border payments. As of now the solution however has not yet been adopted by many financial intuitions.