The largest Japanese e-commerce company, Rakuten, with a market capitalization of more than $ 12.5 billion, will launch its own cryptocurrency.

The announcement was made by the CEO and founder of Rakuten, Hiroshi Mikitani, during his speech at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on February 27.

Mikitani described the Rakuten loyalty system. New element announced as a "borderless currency," underscoring Rakuten's vision of differentiating itself from its online retail rivals, such as Amazon, Alibaba or eBay, and "recreating" the relationship between retailers and merchants. The concept is to recreate the network of retailers and merchants. We do not want to disconnect [them from their customers] but function as a catalyst. That's our philosophy, how to empower the company not only provide more convenience, "said Mikitani.

Rakuten Super Points Loyalty System was launched 15 years ago and has enjoyed significant success since then, resulting in a total issue of more than 1 trillion super points to Rakuten's customers, or about 9.1 billion dollars

Points are earned whenever a customer makes a purchase on the market and may be used to discount future purchases or purchase certain products or services in the market.

The Company intends to implement the Blockchain loyalty program to attract and retain customers, and use the growing interest in cryptocurrencies to recruit new members loyal to the world

Rakuten, however, n 39 did not publish details on the launch date of the service.

The latest announcement comes nearly two years after the Japanese Rakuten acquired the intellectual property. BitTech has opened the Rakuten Blockchain Lab to explore Blockchain applications in e-commerce and financial technologies.