Ripple has announced deals with two banks and three payment processors across India, Brazil and China, as the firm seeks to make good on a promise to transform payment flows into and out of emerging markets.

Itaú Unibanco, Brazil’s largest private sector bank, IndusInd in India and Singaporean money transfer outfit InstaReM have announced plans to use Ripple's enterprise-ready ledger product xCurrent to provide real-time cross-border payments to other financial institutions around the world.



Two fast growing remittance providers, Beetech in Brazil and Zip Remit in Canada, have also come onboard, using Ripple's xVia API to open payment corridors for their customers around the world. Additionally, both will look to establish a connection for their customers into China via e-commerce network LianLian, which signed up to RippleNet last month.



According to the World Bank, global remittance payments are on track to grow by 3.4 percent or roughly $466 billion in 2018, with India and China having the highest incoming flows in 2017.



Patrick Griffin, Ripple’s head of business development, believes that providing faster cross-border transactions at a lower cost is especially crucial for customers in emerging markets.



“The payments problem is a global problem, but its negative impact disproportionally affects emerging markets,” said Griffin. “Whether it’s a teacher in the U.S. sending money home to his family in Brazil, or a small business owner in India trying to move money to open up a second store in another country, it’s imperative that we connect the world’s financial institutions into a payments system that works for their customers, not against them.”